Content area
Full Text
Two Seattle-area tech giants, Microsoft and Amazon, are joining forces to integrate their digital personal assistants, and though no release date has yet been set, the Microsoft-Amazon plan is in the works-executives from the two companies took the stage at the Microsoft BUILD conference in May to show future users how the paired technology could benefit them. For example, users could check their schedules with Cortana on an Amazon Echo or use Alexa to order an Uber while they're using Microsoft Windows 10. On June 5, Amazon announced that devices from Wistron, Compal, and Quanta-all of which have Microsoft's Cortana-are now getting Alexa, too. They join models from HP, Lenovo, Asus, and Acer.
That these two companies would form an alliance isn't a surprise to at least one analyst that follows the industry. Werner Goetz, research director on Gartner's personal technologies team, says we should expect to see even more of these assistants working together across platforms in the future.
Meanwhile, the Amazon and Microsoft collaboration- which was first announced last...