Samsung has been on the back foot in the AI-powered voice assistant race over the past decade. Bixby hasn't performed well compared to Alexa, Google Assistant, and Siri. However, it seems Samsung has big plans for Bixby in the near future. The company revealed that it will bring advanced Generative AI chops to Bixby and use it in all its future home appliances.
Bixby will get more powerful next year, thanks to Generative AI
During its IFA 2023 press conference, Samsung announced its plans to bring Generative AI to Bixby. It also said Bixby and Tizen will come to all its home appliances starting next year. Generative AI is an advanced form of AI used in ChatGPT, Dall-E, Google Bard, and other new AI tools, and it can understand complex sentences to offer information in more ways than one. While current-generation appliances and smart home products powered by Bixby can understand single, accurate target sentences for voice commands, future products powered by newer Bixby can understand complex sentences with more than two meanings. This advanced version of Bixby could come to smartphones and tablets first.
Miyoung Yoo, Vice President of Samsung Electronics' Home Appliances Division, said, “All home appliances from Samsung Electronics have AI. Even water purifiers feature core AI functions. We will go beyond connected home appliances and allow home appliances to provide customized solutions by detecting customers' lives and learning patterns.” Yoo expects future home appliances to go beyond essential functions and offer customized operations based on user behavior and patterns. The new version of Bixby won't be as powerful as ChatGPT or Google Bard, though.
Yoo said, “When we think of generative AI, we often think of ChatGPT, but we are not aiming for such a heavy service. Even if the user hasn't used a set command, Bixby will understand the context of the conversation and enable more natural communication.” He cited the Bespoke Family Hub refrigerator with a 32-inch screen and said, in the future, consumers can say complex voice commands like “It's raining, and I'm in a bad mood, so please draw an appropriate background.”
Samsung is making a lighter version of Tizen called Tizen RT, and it will come to all future home appliances
Samsung also plans to ship all their future home appliances with a lightweight Tizen RT operating system. The company's TVs, premium refrigerators, and other premium appliances already run the full-fledged Tizen OS. The company is developing an MPU (Micro Processor Unit) that will be used in all its future home appliances to run Tizen RT and Bixby for Generative AI features.
The South Korean firm says more than 15 million devices run Tizen OS already, which is expected to reach 20 million by the end of this year. Samsung may unveil features of the upcoming versions of Bixby, Tizen, and Tizen RT during the Samsung Developer Conference 2023 event on October 5.
