In case you haven’t seen, yesterday Sonos announced their own native voice solution. Here’s the tweet announcing it:
As many know, Josh.ai has worked with Sonos and has been a strong advocate for Sonos in the home going back to 2015. Three years ago Josh.ai introduced VoiceCast with Sonos, offering a powerful integration for the whole home. Back in 2016 Josh.ai released this video showing the power of Josh voice with Sonos:
During this time, the number of supported streaming services has grown, the voice capabilities have gotten better, and many Josh.ai homes have integrated with Sonos.
About a year ago, the press started picking up on Sonos exploring making their own voice assistant. Now that this has launched, let’s dive in a bit.
First and foremost, Josh.ai is committed to working with Sonos and believes these services aren’t necessarily competitive. Where Sonos Voice is focused on music, Josh.ai is for whole home automation. The features, capabilities, and refinement behind Josh.ai make it the natural step up for anyone looking for a more complete voice solution. In addition, many Josh.ai homes are using Sonos Amps and Ports, which need an in-room microphone like Josh Micro and Josh Nano to control.
While we are excited to see Sonos leaning into voice control and believe this will help move adoption forward at an even faster rate, it generally takes years to refine and, even then, voice control is difficult. At launch it seems Sonos is supporting “Sonos Radio, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer, and Pandora,” leaving some customers unsatisfied:
In addition, voice control naturally opens up opportunities and problems because people always want more. For example, one Twitter user replied with:
All-in-all we’re happy to see new alternatives for music control by voice and excited to see even more adoption in the smart home. Josh.ai will continue to integrate with and support Sonos, offering functionality like scene control, lights, shades, TV, thermostats, fireplaces and more!
Tweet at us and let us know what you think!
Onward and upward,
Alex Capecelatro, CEO, Josh.ai
