Samsung Aiming to Release Smart Speaker to Compete With HomePod in First Half of 2018

[Abazigal]

Honest question -- what other reason is there? Plenty of less expensive per unit, great sounding, "dumb" multi-room speaker systems have been on the market for years. HomePod is not a game changer in that regard. Seems to me Siri IS the secret sauce here. I mean that would be its only appeal to me -- though right now it's not enough.

HomePods lack of different sized units is it's Achilles heel, though presumably Apple will gradually add to the line with smaller, less expensive models. Once their is an appropriate HomePod speaker for every major room in the house I'm very interested, but only because of Siri integration.

Tons of people bought the amazon echo because of the insanely cheap price. We will see what their retention rate is, if people will still be using Alexa months from now once the novelty wears off.

Or to put it another way, google and amazon are flooding the market with tons of cheap speakers because that’s the only way they can compete. It’s a race to the bottom, and we have already seen this play out with android phones and wearables.

My bet is that Apple will position the HomePod as a high-end accessory with some as-of-yet unknown differentiator which will play into Apple's long term product roadmap. I honestly do not think the only / primary function for stationary smart speakers is to pipe digital voice assistants.

 

[Shanghaichica]

Can Apple improve Siri to enough to compete with other AI assistants?

Google assistant and Alexa are better than Siri but Siri is still better than Bixby.

 

[Bacillus]

Comments about how Samsung is a copycat because the title of this page says that it is aiming to compete with the Homepod, what about the many Echo or Alexa devices out there? I know that the mere mention of Samsung on here is enough to trigger some folk (Please just pretend Samsung doesn't exist etc), but if they release a good sounding bluetooth speaker at a decent price, what's the problem?

Competition is what drives innovation. Look at the reaction the iPhone 8 got with its "huge bezels" compared to almost every other flagship on the market. Apple may not need these companies with the amount of money they have, but the competition is certainly what gets Apple pulling it's finger out to produce better products.

Here is the vaporware copycat that "duplicated" HomePod in advance: www.whyd.com

 

[tridley68]

If you say "Play Halt and Catch Fire," does it halt and catch fire?

Thanks for the laugh I needed it on this early Friday morning.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

Tons of people bought the amazon echo because of the insanely cheap price. We will see what their retention rate is, if people will still be using Alexa months from now once the novelty wears off.

Or to put it another way, google and amazon are flooding the market with tons of cheap speakers because that’s the only way they can compete. It’s a race to the bottom, and we have already seen this play out with android phones and wearables.

My bet is that Apple will position the HomePod as a high-end accessory with some as-of-yet unknown differentiator which will play into Apple's long term product roadmap. I honestly do not think the only / primary function for stationary smart speakers is to pipe digital voice assistants.

I don't think you really understood my point so let me go again. I wasn't positioning the HomePod vs the other smart speakers. I was positioning it against the other "dumb" multi-room speaker systems like Sonos. You had stated that voice assistance wasn't the sole reason to buy the HomePod. My point is, Siri IS the main differentiator among these systems. There is no reason to buy HomePod vs a more mature system like Sonos except that HP incorporates Siri which makes it that much more useful than a "dumb" speaker.

 

[Jbusick7944]

Do you really think these “smart” speakers are in the same league as a $10,000 sound system? That’s like the people who think a cell phone camera is equivalent to full frame Nikon with several lenses.

No, not the same league. But as grow older and really throttle up the big system less and less often, I could see the appeal of some decent sound and much simpler layout.

 

[The Game 161]

They are trying to push Bixby so this is no surprise.

 

[Abazigal]

I don't think you really understood my point so let me go again. I wasn't positioning the HomePod vs the other smart speakers. I was positioning it against the other "dumb" multi-room speaker systems like Sonos. You had stated that voice assistance wasn't the sole reason to buy the HomePod. My point is, Siri IS the main differentiator among these systems. There is no reason to buy HomePod vs a more mature system like Sonos except that HP incorporates Siri which makes it that much more useful than a "dumb" speaker.

I like to think of the HomePod as a computer which happens to double as a speaker (it comes with a A8 chip and all). Sonos is effectively a dumb pipe because they don’t have their own OS or services, much less an ecosystem. The possibilities with the HomePod are endless.

 

[AZ Jack]

And they'll call it the HousePod

I literally did laugh out loud!

 

[Chupa Chupa]

I like to think of the HomePod as a computer which happens to double as a speaker (it comes with a A8 chip and all). Sonos is effectively a dumb pipe because they don’t have their own OS or services, much less an ecosystem. The possibilities with the HomePod are endless.

Right, but you are making my point. It has an A8 chip to support Siri. Without that A8 chip no Siri and it's just a "dumb" speaker. There is no other reason for a speaker to have an A8 chip.

 

[Junior.Nguyen]

Are you never going to buy an iPhone again because they source parts from that "scummy company"?

It's pretty ridiculous either way but I'm hoping Apple ditches Samsung for good in the future for LG
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I kind of wish that MacRumors would just pretend Samsung just doesn't exist, it's just free advertising to a scummy company.

I couldn't agree more but it still sucks how they're getting most of the OLED panels from Samsung :/ hopefully theyrely on LG for next years OLED panels instead of Samsung

 

[calzon65]

No, there haven't. And A LOT of people have been scrutinizing those speakers and their network traffic,and there has not been one single evidence yet that those devices are "spy boxes" or "bugs" either. The simple truth is that no company could afford such a scandal.

However, it is a known fact that regular TELEPHONES and also even pre-smartphone mobile phones were used as bugs by intelligence services from various countries. Your phone is a whole less trustworthy than all smart speakers on this planet combined. The moment your mobile phone is switched on, its position can also relatively easily be triangulated (without GPS) so all of your movements can be tracked. And, again -- this could be done already long before there were smartphones.

The other simple truth is that only the American government was stupid enough to put spyware and backdoors into American network equipment (namely Cisco and Juniper devices) -- the Chinese, for example, knew that nobody would trust their factories any more if they would do something similar.

Great feedback, thank you. I have read stories about backdoors into routers/switches and accessing mobile phones as eavesdropping devices, which is why I asked the question. As more devices incorporate cameras, microphones and sensors (like motion sensors) it's easy to become a little paranoid when considering the hacking possibilities.

 

[nebo1ss]

Tons of people bought the amazon echo because of the insanely cheap price. We will see what their retention rate is, if people will still be using Alexa months from now once the novelty wears off.

Or to put it another way, google and amazon are flooding the market with tons of cheap speakers because that’s the only way they can compete. It’s a race to the bottom, and we have already seen this play out with android phones and wearables.

My bet is that Apple will position the HomePod as a high-end accessory with some as-of-yet unknown differentiator which will play into Apple's long term product roadmap. I honestly do not think the only / primary function for stationary smart speakers is to pipe digital voice assistants.

Amazon has a carved themselves a slice of this market that it will be difficult to displace them from. They have more interfaces to other products than anyone else. I have two of them interfaced to Harmony hub which controls all of my Home theatre, Samsung smart things which control my lights and Honeywell evohome where I can control temperature in individual rooms. My view is this is what drives the market for smart speakers not quality. Those looking for quality spend thousands on quality individual components like amps and speakers etc.

 

[maxfromdenmark]

of course, I'm not surprised at all...

 

[George Dawes]

nvm

tfs

 

[Mad Mac Maniac]

My opinion is no more or less valid than yours, but I want to print what you've said and hang it on my wall.

Please do that'd make me feel pretty special

 

[bruised_apple]

Will it explode?

Just a bit imbalanced in the spin cycle.
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And they'll call it the HousePod

Potty Pod would be more apt.

 

[WWPD]

I prefer Siri because I like the name Siri.
Alexa sounds like a dancer at a gentleman's club and Bixby reminds me of some stuck up British guy who is annoying.

 

[Hustler1337]

I prefer Siri because I like the name Siri.
Alexa sounds like a dancer at a gentleman's club and Bixby reminds me of some stuck up British guy who is annoying.

Just curious about what makes you associate "Bixby" with a stuck up British guy? lol. If anything, I'd say "Bixby" sounds like something far from being posh/snobby/stuck-up.

This speaker by samsung is too late to market, just like the Siri speaker .
Battle will be between echo and google voice.

The only way apple can save it and make it a viable option for the apple eco users, is to improve Siri and put better microphones in the iphones/watches/iPads and a smart system for measuring which device is closest to the user, so not all the devices go in a frenzy when i say he Siri. Perhaps even a “mesh” system, so it can gather the sound input from all your other idevices with the same Apple ID, and letting Siri decide from which device it outputs feedback/requests by measuring your position.
The other way is to be able to build a good 5.1 setup with just HomePods, So give us a an apple center speaker (with an Apple TV and Kinect like device built in and inputs for other sources) and a dedicated apple subwoofer, and they can take my money.

Agree with Samsung and Apple being too late to the market. Amazon and Google have flooded the market with speakers available at all price points. Their Echo Dot and Google Home Mini products were key to that, and it makes it harder for the likes of Samsung and Apple to penetrate the market.

As for your 5.1 suggestion, I disagree. That'll be one expensive setup and more akin to a home theatre solution, which is very unlikely for Apple to venture into. Customers would much prefer a dedicated home theatre setup for that since they're able to do a lot more and do a far better job than multiple Homepods.

 

[ersan191]

Amazon has a carved themselves a slice of this market that it will be difficult to displace them from. They have more interfaces to other products than anyone else. I have two of them interfaced to Harmony hub which controls all of my Home theatre, Samsung smart things which control my lights and Honeywell evohome where I can control temperature in individual rooms. My view is this is what drives the market for smart speakers not quality. Those looking for quality spend thousands on quality individual components like amps and speakers etc.

HomeKit supports all of these things and many, many more through the homebridge framework. Even if you aren't technically inclined enough to use homebridge, HomeKit is open now and it's only a matter of time before all of these are natively supported.

HomeKit also technically supports more device types than Amazon out of the box (Humidifiers, Air Purifiers, Sprinklers, Faucets, etc.)

 

[Abazigal]

Right, but you are making my point. It has an A8 chip to support Siri. Without that A8 chip no Siri and it's just a "dumb" speaker. There is no other reason for a speaker to have an A8 chip.

Yet.

That’s because you are still seeing the HomePod as a speaker, and not a computer.

Just like how the Apple Watch is a computer on your wrist, and does much more than just tell your. And how the iPhone is a computer in your pocket, and does more than just make calls.

 

[Piggie]

It will be very very interesting how much and how many 3rd party devices and services Apple supports.
That could be one of the make-of-break points.
If Apple, goes into typical Apple mode too much.

I suspect none of us are thinking it will connect to anything other than Apple Music?

 

[carloss_r]

Why do I have feeling the same effect is going to happen...referring to every major company was making a smart watch and the ones who are still making them and are the only ones are apple. Feel like that same effect is going to happen in the star speaker topic. Could be wrong.

 

[Abazigal]

Why do I have feeling the same effect is going to happen...referring to every major company was making a smart watch and the ones who are still making them and are the only ones are apple. Feel like that same effect is going to happen in the star speaker topic. Could be wrong.

That's because Apple will be the only company who has the complete ecosystem to completely take advantage of this and the ability to monetise it.

This is exactly the Android vs iOS fight over again. Android and Amazon didn't pick their strategies because that's what they wanted, it was a necessity if they wanted to compete. No one was going to use Android if it wasn't free and if Google wasn't willing to share revenue split three ways with carriers and OEMs. Likewise Amazon *must* be open if they want to get any adoption. Amazon has no leverage to entice IoT makers to support Echo/Alexa in the same way Apple imposes requirements on HomeKit makers. If there were an installed base of 800 million Echos in the world already then they would. And its obvious they'd follow Apple's strategy if that were the case because the user experience would be better and it would be secure.

Apple's not going to lose because they have leverage. An installed base of 800 million iOS devices is leverage. Having aggregated the most affluent customers is leverage. IoT makers are like developers, they'll jump through whatever hoops Apple requires.

 

[bobob]

This speaker by samsung is too late to market, just like the Siri speaker .

Agree with Samsung and Apple being too late to the market.

Yes, the smart home speaker market is fully mature and established - there's no room left for newcomers.

Same as the MP3 player market in 2000, the smartphone market in 2006, the tablet market in 2009, and the smartwatch market in 2014.