Smart speaker 2.0: Generative AI is giving voice assistants a new lease of life

For years, the smart speaker was billed as the next big computing platform. The idea was, instead of tapping a screen, people would talk to an intelligent assistant that could answer questions, play music, order groceries and control the home. More than a decade after Amazon launched the Echo in 2014, that vision is getting a second wind thanks to generative AI. Amazon has rolled out Alexa+ in the US, Apple is rebuilding Siri through Apple Intelligence, and Google is replacing Google Assistant with Gemini.