By Greg Bensinger
SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 15 (Reuters) – Amazon unveiled two new devices on Thursday for listening to and recording people’s information throughout the day to offer calendar reminders and other AI-driven insights under the Bee brand it acquired last year.
Frontier is a bracelet and Eclipse is a brick that resembles a portable magnetic charger. Users attach the Eclipse to their smartphones. They aggregate information from calendars, apps and other data throughout the day, Amazon said.
The Frontier bracelet costs $75 and the Eclipse $100, Amazon said.
“They listen to your whole day,” said Amazon devices chief Panos Panay at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco. “It reminds you of the conversations you had, it reminds you of to-dos that you may have had, it tells you that you have some action items that you committed to other people.”
He said that because the devices are always listening when turned on, users do not have to make reminders for themselves and “can stay more present” throughout the day. The company said users control privacy by deciding when to turn it on and can delete insights or prior conversations as they see fit. Amazon does not store audio.
The company faced criticism after reports in 2019 that thousands of people were listening to conversations people had with its Alexa voice assistant service. It is facing a class action lawsuit over the practice. Amazon has denied any wrongdoing.
(Reporting by Greg Bensinger; Editing by David Gregorio and Rod Nickel)
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