Now Alexa is set to help in car journeys
Actress in €5m bonanza since leaving Corrie
In-car assistant
DRIVERS can ask a new Alexa gadget to check their diaries, get news and play music – without taking their hands off the wheel.
Amazon has launched an on-the-road personal assistant, which it claims can pick up commands over music, air con noise and rowdy kids.
The Echo Auto connects to the net using the driver’s phone and Alexa app.
Amazon spent two years developing it for the UK. It plugs into a car’s 12V power point or USB port.
Website techradar.com said that for older cars, it is a “potentially inexpensive way to add hi-tech functionality to journeys”.
Amazon, which has sold 100 million Echo devices globally, said: “Customers tell us they want to take Alexa everywhere they go.”
With soap’s Chris Gascoyne
MICHELLE Keegan has raked in more than €5million since she left Coronation Street – dwarfing her soap salary.
The actress earned €70,000 a year as Corrie’s Tina Mcintyre before she quit the cobbles in 2014 for other roles. Accounts from her company Rosia Promotions Ltd show she made half a million in both 2015 and 2016, a million in each of the next two years and €1.5million in 2019. The average of €900,000 for those five years is more than 11 times her Corrie salary.
And Our Girl and Brassic star Michelle, 33, is making sure she enjoys her wealth.
She and husband Mark Wright have just paid €1.6million for a property in Essex on which they plan to build a new mansion.
Michelle walked away from the Street because ITV rules ban stars from endorsing products.
She has since picked up a host of money-spinning deals.
A showbiz source said of Michelle: “It was a massive decision to leave Britain’s most popular show but she knew she could make far more cash away from Coronation Street.”
Michelle has plugged beauty products for Ambre Solaire and modelled for Lipsy and Very. She produces her own calendar and is in demand for personal appearances and magazine shoots.
Michelle also played Tracy in the BBC drama Ordinary Lies and football legend Bobby Moore’s wife in Tina and Bobby.