In an event centered on Alexa developer and partner news, Amazon announced new system upgrades, features, and integrations to Alexa. The integrations include a collection of APIs and software development kits (SDKs) aimed at improving Alexa’s efficiency.
Interesting news for Alexa users!
The system upgrades come a month after Amazon demoed the forthcoming features at its annual re:Mars conference in Las Vegas. A particularly interesting function tested in the conference is the ability to synthesize short audio clips into longer speech.
In the event, Amazon’s Universal Device Commands (UDC) and Agent Transfers (AT) were previewed. The pair was developed to ease interaction with multiple voice assistants on the same device. Meaning that devices that support Alexa and another voice assistant can respond to commands from either assistant.
For instance, UDCs in Sonos Voice Control will allow users to say commands using compatible wake words (e.g., “Hey, Sonos, turn up the volume”). Sonos responds even if the target assistant wasn’t used to start the request. ATs, on the other hand, let voice assistants transfer requests they can’t fulfill (e.g., “Ask UberEats to place an order”).
In a nutshell, Amazon’s upgrades mean your device responds to your commands no matter the assistant targeted, and voice assistants can transfer user commands when they can’t execute them. Amazon is also confident that UDC and AT can maximize user experience by combining the capabilities of multiple assistants.
In 2020, Amazon telegraphed the design recommendations of these features in a whitepaper for members of the Voice Interoperability Initiative (VII). It stated that the program was to enable its voice-enabled products to engage with other voice assistants. VII members including Dolby and Facebook, agreed to develop voice assistants that’ll seamlessly engage with the voice assistants of other smart devices.
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