VoiceLabs today announced it will no longer provide analytics services to 3,500 developers and customers making voice apps. Instead, under the new name Alpine AI, the company will help brands and retailers create sales-driven voice apps for Amazon’s Alexa, Microsoft’s Cortana, and Google Assistant.
Alpine AI will combine learnings from running a voice app analytics platform for two years with insights drawn from customers data to create custom voice apps.
This is VoiceLabs’ second major monetization move in less than a year. VoiceLabs launched an Alexa skills ad network in early 2017 but the initiative was shut down in June due to strict Amazon rules about the kinds of skills that permit advertising, CEO Adam Marchick told VentureBeat at the time.
VoiceLabs is becoming Alpine AI, Marchick told VentureBeat today, because the number of people doing voice searches and shopping is growing alongside the number of people with a smartphone or smart speaker.
While monitoring its analytics service in recent months, VoiceLabs found an increasing number of queries from users with an expectation to hear product information or complete a transaction when interacting with a voice app. Last year, Google Assistant and Alexa started to recommend third-party voice apps to complete tasks like meditation or translation.
“There’s about 40,000 voice apps in the market, but we have not seen for example Nike with a big app or Sephora or Home Depot, and if voice is going to be a major ecosystem, the ecommerce 1000 have to play a part,” he said.
As more experiences become available for Google Assistant or Alexa devices with a touchscreen, Alpine AI will assist customers with the creation of multiscreen experiences. Both Google Assistant and Amazon’s Alexa can now begin a query about a product with voice alone, then continue the shopping experience by sending additional information and options to your smartphone.
VoiceLabs analytics services will be provided until March 29. VoiceLabs customers still interested in analytics for their voice apps will be able to use a migration service via Dashbot.io and Chatbase.
