Rohit Prasad, Senior VP Head Scientist, Amazon Alexa, based in Lisbon.
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Amazon’s Alexa chief said the company is in the midst of a generative artificial intelligence boom. The technology has spread rapidly across Silicon Valley, fueling an arms race between Microsoft and Google.
Since OpenAI’s ChatGPT went viral late last year, the tech world has gone crazy for a new generation of chatbots. This puts pressure on companies like Amazon to show off their capabilities in generative AI. Amazon’s biggest market entry to date has been through AI services for cloud customers.
But Rohit Prasad, Amazon’s senior vice president and principal research scientist for Alexa, said it would be a mistake to think that e-retailers have missed out on generative AI, which can transform text-based questions into creative and thorough answers. Stated.
“Alexa has been and will be at the forefront of AI for a long time,” Prasad said in an interview with CNBC. “We are part of the cultural zeitgeist and it is undiminished.”
Prasad added that Alexa is an “out-of-the-box personal AI” that allows people to communicate by voice, as opposed to ChatGPT, which is accessible via a web browser.
Amazon established an early lead in voice software after introducing the Alexa digital assistant in 2014. The company announced Wednesday that it has sold more than 500 million Alexa-enabled devices worldwide. Amazon last updated that number in 2019, when it was at 100 million.
Today, the Alexa Assistant, which is connected to everything from smart speakers to thermostats, has long relied on machine learning technology to retrieve relevant data and answer queries.
But the rise of AI-powered chatbots, which can perform advanced functions like writing novels and coding software, has highlighted the limitations of digital assistants like Alexa. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ sci-fi vision of making Alexa look like the all-knowing computer from “Star Trek” hasn’t exactly come true.
Prasad said Amazon is working to make Alexa more conversational and intelligent. One way the company wants to do that, he said, is with a new version of its own large-scale language model called the Alexa Teacher Model. Large language models power generative AI, and Alexa already leverages Amazon’s LLM.
The goal is to help Alexa answer complex requests and learn more about you.
“Here, who you are, what you are asking, where you are, all your surroundings are reflected and the best decision is made for you in that moment,” said Prasad. .
In his latest letter to investors, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said that the company is making “heavy investments” in generative AI and LLM. He noted that technology has the potential to “transform and improve virtually any customer experience.”
The company has posted job listings suggesting it plans to implement ChatGPT-style products in its online store searches, Bloomberg reported. According to Insider, Amazon could also add more features to Alexa like generative AI with a focus on entertainment and storytelling.
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