Munster Asks, 'Can Anyone Catch Alexa?'

Munster, a co-founder of Loup Ventures, argued that Amazon's strategy of including third-party developers in Alexa gives it the title of being the "Gingerbread Man of digital assistance." Specifically, Amazon was the star of the 2017 CES event with multiple Alexa-enabled devices and there has been little pause in new features since then.

Munster highlighted the fact that there are more than 12,000 apps for Alexa and around 100 manufacturers with integrated Alexa IP across smart home categories. Most recently, Amazon opened its Echo voice processing IP to third party developers which merely extends its lead in smart devices.

"Given our belief that natural language processing is one of a few core technologies that will enable the screen-less future of computing, we think it's important to track the pace of the key players in the field," Munster wrote.

Alexa Still Needs To Get Smarter, Expand To Cars

Munster continued that nearly one-third of Alexa's skills are knowledge-based, but the platform needs to get better at answering basic information questions. Specifically, Alexa answered only 41 percent of information queries correctly, which implies that the platform "needs to get better."

Munster also highlighted the fact that Amazon's advantage over its competitors is "lost" when a user enters their car. The current market leaders include Apple Inc. AAPL's CarPlay and Alphabet Inc GOOG GOOGL Google's Android Auto, which implies Alexa has a "long road ahead," but Amazon is "up for the drive."

Related Links: The 5 Senses Of Computing Gene Munster And His Crazy Crystal Ball ___________ Image Credit: By Amazon.com - Amazon.com, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons