Amazon’s Secretive New Invite-Only Robot Sets Stage for a Search War With Google
Amazon and Google are two competitors that have long been complementary to each other. Despite some small overlap in the internet advertising world, neither have directly made a serious step toward the other’s core…
Amazon and Google are two competitors that have long been complementary to each other. Despite some small overlap in the internet advertising world, neither have directly made a serious step toward the other’s core business model… until now that is.
Historically, the two companies have always driven significant shared revenue together in a more cooperative way. If you search for almost any product, you will see Amazon paying for ads and Google sending some free ones organically. The Kindle device never really took on Google’s Android and instead, stayed pretty niche to book lovers, while Google Shopping never took the full plunge into Google becoming a store.
This all changes now.
I didn’t have the new Amazon Astro device for more than five minutes before I could imagine where Jeff Bezos’ imagination is about to take him as he possibly plans a future of Amazonian robotics monitoring the home and becoming a trusted companion to solve all of our home discovery and consumer needs.
It is currently in the invite-only stage, but the future goals are endless. This model is just a glorified Amazon Echo with wheels, but the fundamentals that are most important to the Amazon team shed some light on some much bigger plans. Those critical details include:
The ability to simply roam and constantly map a person’s home as well as the ability to do face and voice mapping to individuals within the home.
It has been hardwired with discovery features to find or follow people, as well as go to and monitor certain rooms.
The device has the full Video Alexa/Echo features.
The major drawback? The price is currently at $1,000 and rumored to be going up, which I believe will be the greatest holdback in Jeff Bezos’ desire to dominate home search and discovery. The price alone will limit its mass adoption appeal, which happened quickly with the low-cost Alexas.
Another big weakness is the expensive Ring subscription on top of an already pricey device. I think the fee needs to simply be included with Amazon Prime because mass adoption is more valuable than the subscription play here, but that will come later once they establish the value as a trade-off for something bigger.
I believe someone is going to waste a lot of money trying to get a device like this to scale their home stairs, but the winner is going to simply make the device cheap enough to have one on every floor.
Another important aspect to a device like this is the mass adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) happening very fast with ChatGPT, a chatbot launched late last year by OpenAI, and Amazon leading the way.
The devices most likely to benefit are the Alexa, Echo, Astros and expect a doubling down on this AI technology from Amazon because the biggest immediate opportunity will be in the home.
The most likely benefactor will be a device which both dominates the conversational market and has a screen to provide the discovery results thereby replacing a need for the traditional search engine method. The ultimate concept being that most people don’t want to find what they want, they want to be told what they want. I see ChatGPT as being a major player in this moving forward.
So why do I see this as a direct attack on Google’s search business?
I foresee a time when Amazon’s Astro will be my main source for discovery around my house. I will never lose my TV remote again because Astro will be scanning and know where it is. This goes for any other object (keys! eyeglasses!) within the walls of my house. As a search device, understanding my surroundings will take up much more of my expected searches and discovery and is an area Google is very weak in.
Astro also leverages years of leading the way with voice refinement data through Alexa, which gives Amazon a significant advantage in this new informational world. I’ve already seen it with my kids. They prefer to search using verbal commands whenever possible, but verbal commands on devices were not ever good enough until Alexa. As the AI continues to improve and consumer trust in it is built, this will become the norm as it will be easier to use. It didn’t take long for the kids to ask Astro to find a YouTube video or Netflix movie.
Astro already can find my various personal and social contacts just as Alexa can and find the people closest to me. Combine those skills with a robot willing to follow me around and continue conversations and the component of search has a new player.
Most importantly, I see a robot listening and watching and without getting into the privacy and moral implications, it’s clear most people want to think less and get more done quickly. Anyone that has ever spent an hour trying to find something on a search engine to no avail may be open to a device that can with the right sensors and understanding not only find it, but find it quicker and better. Imagine I can point Astro to my TV and he can tell me if there’s a better one I should get or where I can buy a shirt like the one being worn on the show “Yellowstone.” Astro could see I’m almost out of laundry detergent and should probably order some more. Perhaps Astro will see I stubbed my toe and find me a local doctor.
Just as Bezos revolutionized shopping by removing the in-person checkout experience and then he transformed software development with the removal of friction leveraging cloud computing with AWS (Amazon Web Services), I see him doing this once again with his focus on a home discovery companion. That is not going to bode well for Google if they don’t step up their game. Bezos is known for playing the long game so I’m looking forward to seeing how this plays out.