Samsung Confirms A Smart Speaker Is In The Works, Surprising No One

Image courtesy of Samuel M. Livingston

While Amazon, Google, and Apple have all given their voice-controlled intelligent assistants smart speakers to live in, Samsung’s Bixby hasn’t had a speaker to call home. Instead, it’s been limited to the Galaxy S8 smartphone. That may change soon, as Samsung says it’s about to follow its rivals into the smart speaker market.

The president of Samsung’s mobile division confirmed today that a smart spacer will be launched sometime in the near future.

“Maybe soon we will announce it. I am already working on it,” DJ Koh told CNBC.

He adds that in the interest of providing a “fruitful user experience at home” with the company’s devices, he’ll be “moving quite heavily on it.”

Koh didn’t offer details on whether or not the device will be powered by Bixby, but the S8 and new Note 8 both have a feature called “Bixby Home” that lets people connect their devices to their phone.

It’s also unclear how much such a speaker might cost, but it’ll have competition at any price: Alibaba recently announced a $73 voice-activated speaker; the Google Home runs around $129.99, Amazon’s Echo sells for about $180; and Apple’s toilet paper roll HomePod is at the top of the price pile at $349.

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