Samsung unveils first AI voice assistant speaker to compete with Amazon, Google

[Yonhap Photo]

SEOUL -- Samsung Electronics has unveiled its first artificial intelligence voice assistant speaker to check American tech companies Amazon and Google which are top players in the global market. The speaker is equipped with four infra-red transmitters that can send signals to non-connected home appliances such as TVs to control them with voice commands.

Samsung's artificial intelligent (AI) voice assistant speaker, Galaxy Home Mini, was unveiled at the "Samsung Bixby Developer Day" in Seoul on Thursday. The speaker's price and release date were not disclosed, but it is expected to hit the shelves at home in 2020. South Korea has about 4.1 million AI speakers installed at homes and shops.

"With this product, we will increase the number of contact points inside homes and create new user experiences," Samsung's IT and mobile communications division vice president Yi Ji-soo told reporters. He said infra-red signals of home appliances' remote controllers can be registered on to the new AI speaker so that it can control other devices.

With Bixby, an AI voice assistant platform released in 2017, Samsung smartphones can carry out tasks such as controlling connected devices and do keyword searches on the web. However, the company had not released AI speakers while Amazon and Google dominated the AI speaker market, which is growing rapidly by an average annual growth rate of about 24 percent to reach $39.3 billion by 2025.

Park Sae-jin swatchsjp@ajunews.com

Samsung unveils first AI voice assistant speaker to compete with Amazon, Google

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