Google plans to introduce large-scale models to the voice assistant Google Assistant, competing head-on with Apple and Microsoft

Original source: AGI Innovation Lab

As Google continues to integrate generative AI into existing products, Google is finally going to "surge" on its voice assistant Google Assistant. Google Assistant is a voice assistant or intelligent assistant, launched by Google at the Google I/O Global Developers Conference in 2016, similar to Apple's voice assistant Siri.

Image source: Generated by Unbounded AI‌

According to news on August 1, according to an internal email sent to employees by Google Vice President Peeyush Ranjan and Product Director Duke Dukellis recently, Google plans to completely overhaul its Assistant product and increase the ability of large models. Given that Google is promoting the Bard chatbot, it is expected that the new Assistant will have Brad's generative AI capabilities.

Google's leadership said in an email that Google Assistant team leaders "see a huge opportunity to explore what a super assistant powered by the latest LLM (Large Language Model) technology would look like," and described the steps needed to make this happen. some organizational changes to achieve these goals.

Of course, Google is determined to make a "big change" to a successful department, and the reason for the radical change must not be simply seeing the potential of generative AI, but also pressure from competitors, including Apple and Microsoft.

According to news in July, Apple is building its own large language model AJAX, and has internally launched Apple GPT for chatbots like ChatGPT and Google Bard. At the same time, there is speculation that Apple will use a large model to completely revamp Siri. Google, which is already a leader in the field of large models, will not tolerate Apple being overtaken in the voice assistant.

Earlier, Microsoft announced that the Windows operating system will introduce the AI assistant Windows Copilot, replacing the 8-year-old Microsoft Cortana (Cortana), to bring Microsoft into the era of AI assistants.

Generative AI voice assistant still needs to be tested

While AI voice assistants powered by large models and chatbots will almost certainly replace voice assistants of old, the technology has yet to prove to be a practical evolution in this tech space.

The current voice assistants such as Assistant, Xiaona and Siri are more like cramming assistants. Users need to provide sentences composed of subjects and verbs with high specification requirements. This is not exactly what we call "AI". It is useful as an interface for simple digital interactions. In this era of generative AI big bang, these old products seem like antiques.

Google says some work has already begun on improving Assistant, starting with the mobile version of the product.

As part of the move, Google is restructuring the Assistant team, including a small number of layoffs. “We remain deeply committed to Assistant and we are optimistic about its bright future,” Google executives said in an internal email.