Top 5 AI-based Virtual Assistants You Haven’t Heard of

It appears to be only a matter of time until the whole world will use AI-based personal assistants. While most people know about the Siri’s, Alexa’s, and Google Now, there are quite a few other AI assistants under development which deserve more attention. Below is a brief overview of rather unknown AI assistants which all have the potential to change the world as we know it.

5. Soundhound Hound

To most people, it is only normal popular online services have their own artificial intelligence tool. Facebook is working on exactly that, but so is SoundCloud. The audio streaming platform calls its AI solution “Hound”, which works as a voice assistant app for both Android and iOS. The company also created a third-party service called Houndify, which can be used by developers to add voice to their own services.

4. SpeakToIt

One of the things people will do when dealing with an AI assistant is speaking to it, hence the name of this particular project. It is a Siri knock off, but with a slight twist. SpeakToIt can learn custom voice commands. Unfortunately, it appears this project sounds rather robotic, yet it visualizes itself as a human secretary. Users can determine the gender and appearance of their assistant, which is a nice touch. For those users who are not able to use Siri for whichever reason, SpeakToIt can be worth keeping tabs on.

3. Viv

For some reason, it feels natural to think of an AI assistant as a female. Women seem to be better at organizing, micromanaging, and plenty of other tasks that are important in our daily lives. Viv is developed by the same team who invented Siri, and is capable of interpreting complex questions. While Viv is not available to consumers yet, there is a lot of hype surrounding this project already. It is hard to gauge what Viv is truly capable of until the service is released to the public, though.

2. OZLO

Perhaps one of the oddest names for a personal assistant, but never judge a book by its cover. OZLO is a powerful AI designed to help consumers figure out what to eat and drink. Information is pulled from multiple third parties and formatted into informational cards OZLO is capable of understanding follow-up questions, which is a nice touch. The bigger question is whether or not this AI solution can differentiate itself from other tools offering similar functionality.

1. X.AI

Single-purpose AI assistants have yet to find their place in the market, even though X.AI seems to check  a lot of the right boxes. This AI solution keeps tabs on the user’s schedule and preferences, and can even handle all correspondence with others on behalf of its “master”. However, there is a lot of user involvement required to verify calendar data generated from incoming emails.

That being said, X.AI sets itself apart for being one of the most humanlike AI solutions in development right now. The tool is claimed to be “highly focused and intelligent”, assuming it can ever operate on its own. Definitely an artificial intelligence project to keep an eye on moving forward, although X.AI has not received an official release date at this time.

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