IBL News | New York
Amazon, this week at its HQ@ headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, announced upcoming improvements to Alexa around generative AI based on a new, custom-built LLM model optimized for voice interactions.
The new model will power more conversational experiences. It will also take into account body language as well as a person’s eye contact and gestures, said the company.
It will have a more natural-sounding voice and interact with APIs to enable new smart home capabilities.
Amazon decided to give Alexa a more opinionated personality, equipping the new model with expressive responses, including laughter, excitement, empathy, natural pauses, and hesitation to deliver an ostensibly more free-flowing conversation.
Customers in the U.S. will soon get access to these new capabilities through a free preview on Echo devices they already own, Amazon said.
“We’re combining large language models (LLM) with real-world context to make Alexa more intuitive, intelligent, and useful. Using generative AI, speaking to Alexa will feel more natural and conversational than ever before, and Alexa’s ability to reason, infer customer intent, and understand complex requests will remarkably improve. With the latest LLM, Alexa will also be able to process multiple smart home requests at the same time, make inferences, and customers will be able to set up complex Routines, entirely by voice.”
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