Amazon just made it easier for makers of bluetooth devices such as headsets and smart watches to build in the digital assistant Alexa.
The new Alexa Mobile Accessory Kit, generally available starting today, helps developers by minimizing the investment in hardware and integrations, the company says. In a blog post, Alexa Voice Services Principal Product Manger Alfred Woo wrote that Alexa made its early mark integrating with home devices, such as speakers and TVs, and the new development kit is part of a push to create more on-the-go Alexa experiences.
In addition to the new development kit, Amazon also showed off a Qualcomm smart headset reference design. The design gives device makers a production-ready blueprint for Alexa-powered headsets using the new kit.
The new development kit fits with Amazon’s strategy of opening up the digital brain to encourage device makers to build Alexa into their products. As a result, Alexa boasts more than 50,000 third-party capabilities, and it is showing up in devices of all types.
