Samsung’s First AI Speaker

Lee Ji-soo, executive director of the AI Strategy Group at Samsung's Wireless Business Division is introducing Samsung Electronics's first AI speaker “Galaxy Home.”
Lee Ji-soo, executive director of the AI Strategy Group at Samsung's Wireless Business Division, introduces Samsung Electronics's first AI speaker “Galaxy Home.”

Samsung Electronics unveiled its Galaxy Home AI speaker at the Galaxy Unpacking 2018 Event at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York City on August 9 (local time). This was the first time that Samsung disclosed the name of the speaker and introduced the speaker itself to the public. Originally, Samsung's AI speaker was expected to debut at the IFA 2018, Europe's largest consumer electronics event scheduled for the end of this month.

"World-class audio company Harman's AKG technology has created amazing sound," said Lee Ji-soo, executive director of the AI Strategy Group at Samsung's Wireless Business Division. The Galaxy Home features six built-in speakers and a woofer, which delivers stereoscopic sound in all directions. The AI speaker is also loaded with eight built-in microphones, allowing remote speech recognition.

Moreover, consumers can enjoy a wide variety of music via the Galaxy Home as Samsung has forged a partnership with the world's largest music streaming service provider Spotify. "Spotify is going to be on every Samsung device which plays music," said Daniel Ek, CEO of Spotify who attended the event.

The Galaxy Home plays a key role in connecting household appliances such as TVs and refrigerators through Samsung Electronics's Bixby 2.0 AI service. Samsung Electronics plans to build an internet of things (IoT) ecosystem where smartphones, the Galaxy Watch and the Galaxy Home are connected to various home appliances. New Bixby introduced on the day has been improved to naturally communicate with users by learning their behavioral patterns. For example, if a user says, "I want to know about a good restaurant in New York City," Bixby will introduce French restaurants ahead of others based on the fact that the user loves French food.

In the meantime, according to global market researcher Consumer Intelligence Research, the Amazon Echo accounts for 70% of the US AI speaker market while the Google Home for 24%.

Samsung Electronics did not disclose the specific functions and price of the Galaxy Home. The AI speaker’s details will be made public at the Samsung Developers Conference (SDC) in the US this November.

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