After months of setbacks, Amazon finally seems set to debut its long-awaited Alexa revamp, complete with artificial intelligence (AI) to make the disembodied voice just a little smarter than it was before. Amazon hasn’t said as much – at least not directly – but it has unveiled the invites for a press event taking place on 26 February.
It’s there, in New York City, that Amazon is expected to unveil the upgrade. Although the invites don’t immediately give the game away, sticking with simple phrases like “Join us,” “Save the date,” and “You’re invited” – a couple of clever folks from The Verge have pieced the five invites together to reveal a hidden word: Alexa.
Alexa’s turn to bat
That, coupled with the news that Reuters’ sources confirmed the event to be centred around the next generation of Alexa tells us exactly what Amazon has cooked up. The event will have the press turn up to see the new AI assistant in action, where the retail company hopes to convince millions of Alexa users of the new paid-for service, in a desperate bid to turn around an “unprofitable” business model.
Yup, we said paid-for. Months of rumours tell us that Amazon plans to charge a monthly fee for the Alexa upgrade. That doesn’t mean you’ll have to pony up anytime soon, though. If you’re happy with the current version of Alexa that’s only good for telling you the weather and setting the occasional timer, Amazon will leave you be.
The AI integration won’t just be reserved for brand-new Echo and Alexa devices either (though we’re sure there are at least a few in the lab). It can be retrofitted to your current Amazon devices, provided you pay the monthly fee, of course. We expect there to be some sort of cutoff for eligible devices which should be announced at the event.
The new Alexa will supposedly be more conversational with its owners, able to process multiple requests at once. Reports hint that it may act as an “agent” or sorts, taking action in certain areas without first needing to get the user involved. Whether it’ll work as planned remains to be seen. Reuters suggests Amazon execs have a “Go/No-go,” meeting scheduled for 14 February where they will determine the “street readiness” of the upgrade.
Look, we’re not high-level executives running a multi-billion dollar company, but surely discussing the “readiness” of a product less than two weeks before its official unveiling seems like a risky move. Especially considering the several setbacks that have plagued the AI assistant for months now. We’ll have to see how it all pans out at the end of February.
