Amazon, the leading e-commerce major in the world, is all ready to bring Echo, its voice-triggered smart speaker, to India. As per a latest report by Factor Daily, Amazon is aiming to roll out the Alexa-fueled speakers on the occasion of Diwali. To begin with, the firm was stated to roll out the gadget during December this year, but it is now aiming to prepone the roll out.
The report further claimed that the company is testing its Echo Dot and Echo speakers with its workers in the country. The gadgets can come around with a price tag of Rs 5000 to Rs 6000 and Rs 11,000 to Rs12,000, respectively. As per one more report, the devices will back regional languages of India such as Marathi, Hindi, and Tamil in addition to English. The firm, at its Chennai facility, is also designing a multilingual interface.
Amazon Echo is fueled by Alexa, the AI-equipped voice assistant of the company. It can also play a role of a smart hub gadget for automation of home. Declared in 2014, the gadget lets consumers manage everyday tasks, enjoy music, and ask queries through voice commands. It provides real-time answers for queries ranging from news, cooking, and sports to even fundamental daily tasks like knowing the stock markets, weather, and many others. Amazon Alexa will battle against other personal AI assistants such as Google Assistant, Apple’s Siri, and Microsoft Cortana.
Lately, Amazon rolled out a new feature in India dubbed Local Finds. The feature allows consumers sell and buy second-hand products to/from users residing in their area. The feature is analogous to those discovered in services such as Quikr and OLX. Currently, the service is only available through site and can’t be utilized via the app.
The service comprises 10 segments of products that comprise tablets, mobiles, video books, movies, games, mobile covers, jewelry, home, and clothing. The online retailer is testing “Local Friends” in Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Chennai for now, but it will also be soon introduced in various other cities. Concerned sellers can choose any group from the menu and publish an ad for the product they need to trade.