Amazon Introduces Alexa+ Next Generation Voice Assistant Powered by Generative AI

Amazon unveiled its new voice assistant Alexa+, now fully enabled by artificial intelligence. This is the predictable next step to bring back voice interfaces and personal assistants, directly interfacing and powered by generative AI engines, which helps explain why Amazon called Alexa+ its new personal AI assistant. The promotion shows a more conversational and more capable natural language voice interface. Time for the audio industry to start looking again at voice front-ends and smart speakers?

Speechmatics, a pioneer in speech recognition and currently a leader in multilanguage transcription technology, has announced the launch of an API that will enable developers to build voice interactions into any product, including AI assistants and agents. Flow combines Speechmatics' real-time automatic speech recognition (ASR) with large language models (LLMs) and text-to-speech capabilities, offering a complete solution for voice-based interactions that are accurate, responsive, and secure.

Pandora introduced Voice Mode, a new, native smart assistant powered by Houndify Voice AI platform that allows listeners to control Pandora’s mobile app and enjoy new music discovery using simple voice commands, providing an intuitive, hands-free experience tailored for the unique tastes of each user. Pandora will roll out access to Voice Mode to select listeners on iOS and Android, with general availability for all mobile users coming soon.

In line with market trends, at CES 2017 Conexant is showing new hardware and software solutions designed to enable new voice-enabled AI assistant devices and next-gen USB-C type headphones. Conexant is showcasing its latest embedded hardware and software solutions designed to make it easy for CE manufacturers to develop new high-performance voice-enabled products and USB-C digital headphones.