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Twine: Bridging the gap between conference room functions and team collaboration tools.Īviel Ginzburg, managing director of the accelerator, told GeekWire that the companies are pushing boundaries for what’s possible with voice technology and ambient user interaction.

Tinitell: Your kid’s first mobile phone.

Sensible Object: Merging physical and digital and harnessing the power of devices already in the connected home to power face-to- face social interaction and entertainment.

Pulse Labs: User-centered interaction testing for voice apps, with actionable insights and analytics from target audiences.

Play Impossible: An active gaming system that brings digital action outdoors.

Novel Effect: Powering voice interactive entertainment.

Botnik Studios: Digital tools for self-expression.

Aspinity: Ultra-low power processors for IoT devices.

The nine companies worked closely with Amazon over the past 13 weeks and had access to the technology behind services like Alexa Skills Kit, Alexa Voice Services, Amazon Web Services and Amazon Launchpad. The tech giant has already invested in more than 30 startups as part of the fund.Īmazon and Techstars, which also runs a separate Seattle accelerator program, invested an initial $20,000 in each participating company for 6 percent common stock, with potential for an additional $100,000 convertible note.

The accelerator is part of Amazon’s $100 million Alexa Fund, which launched in 2015 and is used by Amazon to invest in companies that will push the boundaries of voice-based interaction.

The next generation Amazon Echo and the Echo Plus, which is equipped with a built-in smart home hub. A recent forecast from eMarketer estimates that Amazon will have a 71 percent market share of all voice-enabled speakers in the U.S. Amazon is battling other tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and Apple in the competitive voice assistant market, though it has a big lead as the first mover. Both the Alexa virtual assistant and Echo devices are two of the company’s most successful products. But as we say at Amazon, it is still Day 1.”Īlexa powers Amazon’s Echo smart devices, and can be integrated into other third-party devices. “We will see many different kinds of technologies emerge and many different use cases of conversational AI. “When I walk through the floor here and see what you all are doing, it’s incredibly exciting,” Prasad told the crowd. Prasad talked about the complexity of Alexa’s technology - “while it seems simple, it is incredibly hard to make it work,” he noted - but also showed how there are seemingly-infinite opportunities for engineers and entrepreneurs to tackle on this nascent platform. But as we say at Amazon, it is still Day 1. We will see many different kinds of technologies emerge and many different use cases of conversational AI. Rohit Prasad, vice president and head scientist for the Amazon Alexa team - which has grown to 5,000 employees - gave an opening keynote before each startup pitched their ideas to a crowd of investors, entrepreneurs, and others from the community.

Rohit Prasad, vice president and head scientist for the Amazon Alexa team. On Tuesday the program culminated with a Demo Night at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood.