CES 2024 news Amazon: partnerships, innovations and technology

The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2024 was a highly anticipated event, offering companies the opportunity to present their new products and innovations to audiences around the world. Amazon was featured in a number of new products, announcing important partnerships and demonstrations in the field.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Siemens bring generative AI to the CES stage.

During the opening keynote, Amazon Web Services (AWS) Vice President of Product Matt Wood took the stage with Siemens Global CEO Roland Busch to announce a partnership between the two companies. The goal of this collaboration is to make it easier to access generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools in different industries.

Siemens is integrating Amazon Bedrock, a service that offers a choice of basic high-performance models provided by leading artificial intelligence companies via a single API. This will allow customers to build, scale and enhance their existing applications with the power of generative AI on AWS.

Customers will be able to select the generative AI model best suited to their specific use case and quickly and securely incorporate it into their applications. This will make software development easier, faster and more efficient, enabling users to integrate generative AI features with just a few clicks.

A new partnership with Fire TV and Panasonic

Panasonic announced a global partnership with Amazon to integrate Fire TV into its new smart TVs starting in 2024. With Fire TV and access to Alexa, customers will be able to enjoy a world of entertainment, including live content and streaming apps.

Panasonic also unveiled two new flagship OLED smart TV models with integrated Fire TV. Panasonic’s Z95A and Z93A models will enable customers to easily launch apps, play music, search for titles, and control compatible smart home devices via remote voice control with Alexa. When not in use for viewing content, these TVs transform into dynamic displays with the Fire TV Ambient Experience feature. This feature turns the largest screen in your home into an always-on smart display that can show personal photos and information such as calendars and reminders through customizable Alexa widgets.

Learn more about your car with BMW’s assistant based on Alexa’s advanced language model (LLM)

Your car is the perfect place for a voice assistant, and Amazon and BMW have shown what’s possible with new features powered by Alexa’s advanced language model(LLM). These new features offer a more natural way to learn about your new car and allow you to perform certain actions instead. Instead of looking in the car’s manual, you can ask the BMW assistant for advice on different BMW driving modes and have the assistant perform the mode of your choice. You can also ask for instructions on how the car’s features, such as the parking assistance system, work and hear explanations in easy-to-understand terms through the BMW Assistant’s personalized voice.

Matter Casting on Fire TV and Echo Show 15

Amazon has long supported the use of open technology standards to give customers more choice of devices and services to use in their homes. For this reason, Amazon is a founding member and a key contributor to the Matter standard. At CES, Amazon announced Matter Casting, which allows customers to stream content directly from supported streaming apps on iOS and Android to Fire TV and Echo Show 15 devices. Customers can start watching a movie or search for their next favorite show on Prime Video from their phone and stream it to their Fire TV device or compatible Echo Show 15. This is a preview demonstration of a Matter implementation.

“We are excited to work with Amazon to bring Matter Casting to the STARZ app. Matter was easy to integrate and will offer even more options for customers to enjoy our vast collection of original series and popular movies on the device of their choice,” said Alison Hoffman, President of STARZ Home Networks.

Matter Casting is available now for customers worldwide who want to stream Prime Video content from iOS and Android devices to the Echo Show 15. It will also be available in the coming months for compatible Fire TV devices, including Panasonic smart TVs with integrated Fire TV. Amazon is collaborating with Plex, Pluto TV, Sling TV, STARZ and ZDF to add support for Matter Casting by the end of the year.

The latest generation of Zoox’s bespoke robotaxi with an exclusive waiting list for early adopters

After achieving major milestones, including becoming the first company in history to operate a custom-built robotaxi on public roads with passengers on board, Zoox unveiled its latest generation of custom-built vehicles at CES 2024. Zoox offered CES attendees the exclusive opportunity to join the waitlist and be among the first to use its autonomous car rental service.

New Alexa experiences powered by generative AI from developers

In 2023, Amazon introduced new tools to make it easier and faster for developers to use generative AI to create conversational experiences with Alexa. Starting today, customers can try some of these new experiences developed by developers.

With Character.ai, Alexa customers can have fun conversations with a variety of characters, including motivational fitness coaches, historical figures like Socrates, book recommendations from librarian Linda, role-playing with Text Adventure Game, and more.

Splash is linking its AI-based music creation technology to Alexa. Customers can interact with the Splash experience to create their own song and customize elements such as genre, lyrics, and more, all via voice control. Afterwards, customers can send the song they created to their cell phone. AI-based game developer Volley announced the launch of AI-based “20 Questions,” a more in-depth version of the popular parlor game that uses generative AI to interact with customers through engaging questions and conversations.

AI advances with the Alexa Fund.

In addition to showcasing its own products, Amazon showed a selection of companies from the Alexa Fund portfolio at CES. This included MultiOn, a new artificial intelligence personal agent. MultiOn demonstrated its navigation experience, which allows customers to use the agent to perform tasks such as booking a table at a restaurant or inviting their friends to dinner, all in an automated mode. Embodied, Inc, a company focused on AI-based robotic companions, showed the evolution of its Moxie robot – Moxie AI – which will offer children emotional and academic support. It will be available for purchase in 2024.

The Alexa Fund invests in technologies and startups that spur innovation in areas such as artificial intelligence, smart devices and new media.