Over 100 million devices featuring Alexa have already sold, Amazon SVP of devices and services Dave Limp told the Verge. Limp said the company went beyond its own expectations for Echo Dot during the holiday season but declined to give more specific details. There are more than 150 products with Alexa built in, more than 28,000 smart home devices that work with Alexa made by more than 4,500 different manufacturers, and over 70,000 Alexa skills. Samsung said it will be opening up its 2019 QLED TV lineup to other voice assistants, such as Alexa or Google's Assistant.
Amazon’s strategy for Alexa this year will be a continuation of what it’s been doing so far: building the foundation for an ambient computing platform, Limp added. The executive wants to get as many devices to use Alexa as possible, and he wants those devices to do as much as possible. “I think someday, third-party Alexa-enabled endpoints may be vastly larger than what we produce ourselves,” he says. His team’s focus is on building out tools and APIs for third-party developers alongside making Echo products.
“You need breadth and depth. … The way to get the breadth is to build tools that are self-service, that are free, that are easy to use, and that are widely available for developers,” he said. Those tools include things like the Alexa Connect Kit, a hardware module that can make adding Alexa to a gadget nearly plug-and-play, plus APIs and SDKs, which make it easy to integrate software products into Alexa. This led to the surprise support for Apple Music on Echo, the Verge noted.
Alexa will focus on becoming more conversational and generally less awkward to use. It will also focus heavily on enabling partners to make more Alexa features this year, and to push hard on international expansion to drive those adoption numbers even higher.
