Google tries new approach with voice on Pixel phone
san francisco — About six months ago, people working on hardware and the voice-activated Google Assistant for the Pixel phone started sitting next to each other at the company’s Mountain View, California headquarters, hammering out minute details of its first phone.
The new seating arrangement illustrated a much larger shift under way at Alphabet’s Google, which crashed Apple’s smartphone revolution eight years ago by giving away its Android software and letting handset makers do the rest.
Google software now runs on 85 per cent of the world’s smartphones, but as voice control threatens to replace touch as the primary means of using a hand-held device, the company is experimenting with a different approach.
The Pixel’s hardware and Assistant teams gather for happy hour every Friday and have already received a prototype for the camera on next year’s phone, said Brian Rakowski, vice-president of product for Google’s Android operating system.
Their ambition: to make the company’s voice-powered digital assistant better than rivals such as Apple’s Siri and Microsoft Corp’s Cortana.
“We wanted the Assistant on the phone to feel like a natural extension of the ways you ask Google for information,” Rakowski said.
The fusion of hardware and software is key to that goal. Certain specifications are crucial for a highperforming assistant, such as a well-placed microphone and a powerful processor to crunch reams of data.
Creating an app isn’t enough; that requires a few clicks for users to get to it.
The hardware and software teams worked closely on details such as the graphics that appear when users call up the assistant, settling on a flurry of colourful dots, which Rakowski called a “whimsical touch to give a little bit of life to the home button.”
The Assistant is always at the ready on the Pixel phone and can be summoned by pressing the home button or saying the words “OK Google.”
By integrating the Assistant into the Pixel, Google “doesn’t have to do negotiations with another handset maker — they can make it as tight as they want,” said Charles Jolley, chief executive of Ozlo, which offers a digital assistant by the same name.
To make sure users get the best possible experience, the Assistant will live only on Google products such as the Pixel, at least for now. — Reuters Printed and Published by Galadari Printing & Publishing (LLC), P.O. Box 11243, Dubai. Telephone: 3384545, 3383535. Telefax: 3382238, 3383676. e-mail: business@khaleejtimes.com. Internet Home Page: www.khaleejtimes.com