Samsung will be unveiling a new AI product named NEON at CES 2020. The mysterious product is being developed by STAR Labs (Samsung Technology & Advanced Research Labs), an independent unit of Samsung Electronics, that states “human-level AI with the ability to speak, recognize, and think” as one of its goals.
The Korean tech giant has created dedicated social media handles and a website for NEON. Everything that is known about NEON so far comes from the teasers posted by these handles. Even they don’t reveal anything specific about the new AI product, but the constant use of “Have you ever met an ‘ARTIFICIAL'?” in all its messages suggest NEON is probably more than an overhyped software feature for smartphones.
You will soon meet #NEON pic.twitter.com/Sm1WbhG0Er
— NEON (@neondotlife) December 23, 2019
Given Mistry’s previous work and NEON’s teasers, the new product will probably have an element of sci-fi to it. Interestingly, well-known Indian filmmaker Shekhar Kapur also tweeted about Mistry bringing sci-fi-level technology to the market through NEON. Perhaps, a talking robot? A holographic AI assistant? We don’t know. Our guess is as good as yours at this point in time.
Currently, Bixby functions as Samsung’s AI-powered digital assistant across its product categories. It’s not clear where and how this new AI offering will fit into all of this. In a recent tweet, NEON has clarified it is “not about Bixby” and is unlike anything we have seen before. Considering the massive investment Samsung made in the last couple of years to improve and market Bixby, it’s not surprising that NEON has different goals. It seems more plausible that NEON and Bixby will complement each other rather than compete.
