A new report full of leaks from Bloomberg suggests that Amazon is about to launch at least three new Echo devices, among other Alexa features.
About five years ago and after the failure of the Fire smartphone, I never would have expected Amazon to be such a dominant player in the tech space, but the company has proven me wrong with its extensive line of Fire TVs and smart home hardware. .
The retail giant has a new hardware event on September 28, so it stands to reason that we are about to see several new Echo devices, and this leaked report outlines exactly what we should expect.
Alexa sound bars
The report claims that Amazon is working on a new soundbar with Alexa integration and a camera. Ideally, this would be used to make video calls from your TV, similar to Facebook’s Portal TV device.
This wouldn’t be the first soundbar with built-in access to Alexa, but it would offer users substantial value as a soundbar. It will be interesting to see if it also runs Fire TV or something closer to an Echo smart display.
Echo smart wall display
Amazon has finally done it … reportedly. The leaks also mention that the company is working to transfer a 15-inch smart display to a kind of wall-mounted smart home controller. I think this is a really smart idea, even if people don’t naturally gravitate towards buying.
In my apartment, the moment I lifted my smart screen from table height to counter height, I began to interact a lot more with its touch screen. I think this is simply because now I don’t have to bend over to use it.
That said, the leak indicates that Amazon’s device will feature a 15-inch screen, which appears a bit large. Still, I’ll reserve more judgments until I see what it’s like if Amazon actually reveals it next week.
New Echo Auto
Along with the other two new pieces of hardware, it seems Amazon isn’t giving up its dreams of an in-car smart assistant. The latest update may include a way to charge a user’s smartphone.
I always found the Echo Auto a bit of an awkward device, so it will be exciting to see if Amazon has innovated the previous version in any meaningful way if this leak turns out to be true.
We may not see the Alexa robot
In recent years, there have been several rumors that Amazon is working on a smart home robot similar to the Samsung Ballie robot, at least in concept. However, the latest report claims that some Amazon engineers are against the product and are not sure that it is actually something people want.
They may be right.
Karaoke function in Alexa
The report also mentions a discarded Karaoke machine that featured Alexa. This sounds fun and somewhat useful if you could ask Amazon’s assistant to play songs for you to sing along.
Overall, this is stacking up to be a pretty mediocre Amazon show, but maybe the company has some headline-grabbing surprises. The event will take place on Tuesday, September 28 at 12 pm ET / 9 am PT.