Providing market intelligence for more than 35 years

In The News

One Bot To Rule Them All? Not Likely, With Apple, Google, Amazon And Microsoft Virtual Assistants

In order for a virtual helpmate to run your life, it needs to engage with the providers of all the services you rely on, from your calendar app to your Uber ride. Those providers must either partner with the company operating the assistant, or design their app to integrate with the assistant. So Spotify will stream music upon request via Alexa, and Honeywell's smart-home thermostat, via Assistant, will bump up the temperature 15 minutes before Grandma's expected arrival.

For providers, "if there is a competitive advantage to be gained, then absolutely they will do it," said Brett Sappington, senior director of research at market research firm Parks Associates.

From the article "One Bot To Rule Them All? Not Likely, With Apple, Google, Amazon And Microsoft Virtual Assistants" by Ethan Baron.

Previously In The News

Facebook Entices VR Content Creators With Open Source Surround Cam

What's more, this summer Facebook will offer the plans for the camera and the code for its software for free on the popular developers' website GitHub. "We're open-sourcing the camera and the softw...

Apple Mulls Time Warner Takeover; And Possibly Netflix

Parks Associates recently found that Amazon has moved into a virtual tie with Google at 22% of sales for streaming media players (Roku claims the top spot). Apple TV comes in at fourth place with 20%...

On-Demand Tech Support Companies HelloTech, Geekatoo Merge

Geekatoo Executive Chairman Christian Shelton saw demand for tech services rising as more people add internet-connected devices - such as the smart thermostat Nest or WiFi camera Dropcam - to their ho...

Apple May Be Prepping Siri for Smart Home Duty

Entry into the smart speaker market makes sense for a company with smart home aspirations. "As the success of Echo and Google Home took off, everyone expected Apple to follow suit," said Brad Russe...