Hajra Naz
Relay, an AI-powered workflow automation tool, launched back in 2021. Its original goal was ambitious. The company wanted to become the next Zapier. Now, that plan has changed course entirely. Relay is shutting down. Some of its staff are moving on too. That includes its top executive, who’s joining Google’s Chrome team.
Jacob Bank, Relay’s founder and CEO, shared the news directly. He posted a company announcement on Monday. According to that announcement, Relay will shut down access for paying customers on September 14. Free customers already lost access earlier. That happened on August 15. The app’s closure was actually first announced back in July.
The bank has an interesting history with Google. He previously spent just over six years there. Now, he’s rejoining the company in a new role. According to his LinkedIn, Bank will serve as VP of Product for Google Chrome. In that position, he’ll lead both product and developer relations teams for Chrome.
Bank shared his own thoughts on the move in a post on X. He said he’s spent his entire career focused on one thing. That’s building tools that help people accomplish more with AI. He added an important caveat, too. Those tools shouldn’t sacrifice personal creativity or individual insight. He described joining the Chrome team as an ideal opportunity. It gives him a chance to bring those same experiences to a much larger audience.
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The bank teased more news to come. He said there are ambitious plans in the works. Those plans focus on helping users work with AI directly in Chrome. He promised more details would be shared soon.
Bank’s relationship with Google goes back further than his recent departure. He originally joined the company in 2015. That happened after Google acquired his previous startup. That company was called Timeful, a scheduling app. At Google, Bank worked across several different areas. He served as product lead for Gmail. He also led product for Google Calendar and Google Chat. Eventually, he left to launch Relay.
Relay’s product shared some similarities with Timeful. It offered users productivity improvements through workflow automation. Businesses used it to streamline repetitive tasks. That included document drafting and copyediting. It also included various project management tasks.
One question remains open for now. It’s unclear exactly how Bank and his team plan to integrate AI further into Chrome. Still, Bank offered one clue about his thinking. He described Chrome as a perfect platform for collaborating with AI agents.
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This move fits into a broader pattern at Google. The company has steadily pushed AI deeper into its user experience. The integration of Gemini into Search has already reshaped Google’s front end significantly. That shift has had ripple effects across the rest of the internet too. Gemini has also made its way into Chrome directly. There, it functions as an optional in-browser assistant for users.
Overall, these integrations appear to be landing well with users. Google recently shared a major milestone related to this trend. According to the company, Gemini has now crossed 1 billion users worldwide.
