Amazon is turning to a new strategy to improve the functionality of its voice assistant Alexa. In this regard, it aims to make Alexa a more practical tool for users by collaborating with popular platforms such as Uber, OpenTable and GrubHub. The company aims to go beyond Alexa being an assistant that only provides information, offering a platform that will help users complete their daily tasks.
Drastic changes to Amazon Alexa functionality
Amazon’s new approach is based on ensuring that Alexa can fully perform tasks. For example, when users tell Alexa to reorder the pizza they ordered last week, Amazon Alexa will be able to connect directly to their GrubHub account and place the same order. This is an innovation that goes beyond the existing Alexa Skills structure and aims to reduce users’ time loss.
In this context, according to information shared by Business Insider, Amazon plans to cooperate with approximately 200 different partners to expand Alexa’s capabilities. With these collaborations, Alexa’s already available functions, such as calling an Uber or making a restaurant reservation, will be more deeply integrated. However, the full scope of these new features or whether all partnerships have been finalized is not yet clear.
On the other hand, Amazon’s goal with these new integrations is to turn Alexa into a smarter and more independent assistant, not just a command and control tool. This stands out as a step that changes the current structure of Alexa and offers a more intuitive experience for users.
However, this new strategy also has a disadvantage. Amazon plans to charge a certain fee to offer these new capabilities. This may impact Alexa’s accessibility to its user base. Additionally, whether local businesses will take part in this new system is an important question mark.
These innovations planned for Amazon Alexa represent a significant transformation for the future of the voice assistant. These steps taken by the company to improve the user experience aim to both increase the functionality of Alexa and strengthen Amazon’s competitive power in this field.