Microsoft is working with third parties to bring Cortana to their devices
Zo, Cortana Devices SDK and Skills Kit, new intelligence tools - these are how Microsoft's AI vision will come to life.
It’s no secret that Microsoft is all-in with artificial intelligence research, and is specifically banging a lot on bots and digital assistants. For example, it has just officially launched the Zo chatbot in the Kik Messenger app, and made generally available a Skype Calling API that lets bots receive and handle Skype calls. Cortana is also coming to the IoT Core edition of the Windows 10 Creators Update.
But to make AI accessible to all, more needs to be done. In order bring an intelligent agent to all, Microsoft has also unveiled a new Cortana Skills Kit and Cortana Devices SDK to help developers and device makers alike hop onto Microsoft’s bot and digital assistant train more easily. And one of the early fruit of the Cortana Devices SDK is a Harman Kardon speaker.
Specs-wise, little is known about this Harman Kardon device except for the fact that it’s a “premium” home speaker and has Cortana built in. The teaser video (below) of the speaker, wich is coming to market in February 2017, doesn’t reveal much either. However, based on what we know about the Cortana Devices SDK, it should be able to support real-time, two-way audio communications with Skype, Email, and calendar, and has list integration. It probably won’t be positioned as an Amazon Echo competitor at launch, but that’s entirely likely further down the road when the Cortana Skills Kit is fully fleshed out. In Microsoft’s own words, Cortana Skills Kit will “allow developers to leverage bots created with the Microsoft Bot Framework and publish them to Cortana as a new skill, to integrate their web services as skills and to repurpose code from their existing Alexa skills to create Cortana skills.”
In short, soon you'll have Cortana everywhere, from PCs, phones, and Xboxes to speakers, fridges, and cars.
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