No details were given during the call in terms of a competitive ad-business plan for Google to gain footing in the voice-based software and devices game it’s currently losing to Amazon.
Heavily relied upon screen ads were the topic of scrutiny, since neither voice-activated devices such as Amazon Echo or Google Home use screens. Pichai said Google won’t nix screens entirely from the company’s voice-based technologies.
Sundar says that voice will be only “one mode,” and that “Users will have many different ways by which they interact” with computers, reports Business Insider.
Ad revenue is the biggest obstacle Google faces. It’s questionable whether the company can sustain without it.
“We think about it from a long-term perspective,” Pichai said. “So I see more opportunity than challenge when I think about voice search.”
When asked about comparative sales lagging behind rivalry Amazon Echo, Pichai reminded RBC Analyst Mark Mahaney that Google Home has only been on the market since November, reports Geek Wire.
“We just launched it in Q4,” said Pichai, as reported by Geek Wire. “We had a very strong quarter there and we are going to invest a lot in it over 2017. It’s very early days. When I look at what it would take to do voice search well, our years of progress … in areas like natural language processing come into play and I think there’s a lot of work ahead to make all of this work well for users. This is a core area we have invested in for the very long term. So I feel very comfortable about how this will play out in the future.”
