New devices accelerate Google’s move into hardware.
Laptop, speakers, camera among hardware debuts
Google already has the ability to know your route from home to work, what you search for online and what’s in your email.
Now, the Mountain View tech company wants you to buy its hardware products that will tie all of those software features together.
On Wednesday, Google announced a family of new or updated electronic devices, including a music speaker, a convertible laptop, smartphones, a virtual reality headset, a camera for candid shots and a smaller Internet-connected speaker that can all be linked to its digital assistant and apps.
The announcement accelerated the company’s move into hardware, which began last year when it started selling Pixel smartphones — the first phones that Google had designed from start to
The Pixel 2 phones, which use a single-lens camera to create portrait photos, start at $649 for the 5-inch version and $849 for the 6-inch one. The phones will become available in several weeks at Best Buy and Verizon stores as well as at Google’s online store.
Rishi Chandra, a Google vice president, said the company sees hardware becoming an important line of its business, in which Google products differ from those of competitors because of their artificial intelligence. Meanwhile, rival Apple — known for its hardware — wants to grow its services business.
Chandra said Google is not just trying to gather more data for advertising, and people can always opt out of sharing information. The company is investing heavily in hardware and expects it to be an important growth area, he said. He declined to say what percentage of Google’s revenue comes from hardware.
“We do believe that hardware can be a meaningful business,” Chandra said in an interview with The Chronicle. “Apple has proven this.”
Still, some analysts said that they believe Google’s goal is less about making money off of the and more about retaining all of the users of its popular apps. Several of Google’s services, including Gmail and Google Maps, have more than 1 billion users each.
“Clearly, hardware is going to help the subscribers and users stick with their ecosystem as opposed to abandoning (Google) and going to Samsung and Apple,” said Wayne Lam, a principal analyst with market research firm IHS Markit.
Last month, Google announced plans to spend $1.1 billion to acquire roughly 2,000 employees from Taiwanese tech firm HTC. The move will help the company build its own devices, after selling its Motorola Mobility business several years ago.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai envisions a future in which artificial intelligence plays a bigger role in everyday lives because the technology is more contextual, conversational, adaptable and used across multiple devices.
“We think we’re in a unique moment in time where we can bring AI, software and hardware (together) to bring a different perspective to solving problems for users,” Pichai said at a press event held at the SFJazz Center.
The Pixel 2 smartphones will work with Google’s new Pixelbook laptop that starts at $999 and becomes available on Oct. 31. The Pixelbook, which weighs 2.4 pounds, can fold into a tablet or have its screen propped up for viewing video. The laptop works with a $99 Pixelbook Pen that allows users to circle words or images that they want to learn more about. Google’s digital assistant will pull up that information on their screen. The Pixelbook Pen can also be used for writing or drawing on the tablet.
Google also unveiled Pixel Buds, $159 smart earbuds connected to each other with a wire, that work with Android phones. Pixel Buds will work with iPhones, but those users will not be able to get access to Google’s digital assistant through the earbuds.
The company rolled out two new speakers for the home, each voicefinish. activated and tied into Google’s larger universe of cloud-based search and information services.
The $49 Google Home Mini is a smaller version of original smart speaker Google Home, but designed as less obtrusive and more decorative.
The $399 Max is pitched as a music and entertainment device, like old-style bookshelf speakers but with content streaming from the cloud. This speaker is able to tailor the sound to the shape of a room, which will put it in direct competition with Apple’s upcoming Siri-activated HomePod speaker.
Customers can broadcast voice messages like “Dinner is ready!” or “It’s time to wake up!” over more than one Google Home speaker using Google’s digital assistant through apps or on a Pixel phone. The company said it is working on developing more features for kids such as storytelling.
Google also previewed Google Clips, a small, square camera designed to automatically take and sort candid 8-second video clips. Clips includes artificial intelligence technology so that it takes short, candid video clips of people it recognizes and highlights moments to download to a phone.
Google officials said Clips does not store the images or send them to the cloud, but customers can chose to share favorite shots captured, such as a baby’s first steps.
The camera will cost $249 and will work with Pixel phones, Samsung Galaxy 7 and 8 phones and Apple’s iPhone 6 or newer phones. Google says the candid camera will be available “soon” but has given no specific release date.
Some analysts also cautioned that consumers should be aware that what they opt to share could be used in the future for advertising. Goohardware gle makes its money through ads that are targeted toward its users and by providing anonymous information on its users to businesses.
“Consumers need to know everything they do will be tracked and be used for advertising,” said Patrick Moorhead, president of Moor Insights and Strategy. He called Google Clips “very creepy as Google’s business model is advertising.”
Chandra said Google wants to provide a great user experience and is not focused on making money off its digital assistant.
“Over time, there will be probably opportunities for monetization to fit into this,” Chandra said. He said users can choose “what they want to share or don’t share.”