It can handle multiple complex requests and act like an agent, ordering up Ubers, reserving seats at restaurants or tickets to concerts. It also handles home automation tasks.
80% of American households have Amazon Prime, ticking in at 180 million users, and 70 million people have some kind of Echo device with Alexa on it.
That is a huge user base to start off from for a semi-new agentic LLM, even though it is partially powered by Anthropic.
The Alexa+ assistant can also be accessed through an app, or at Alexa.com, and non-Prime users can pay $20 a month for access.
Read more: Amazon’s announcement, writeups on The Verge and CNBC.