Providing market intelligence for more than 35 years

In The News

One Bot To Rule Them All? Not Likely, With Apple, Google, Amazon And Microsoft Virtual Assistants

In order for a virtual helpmate to run your life, it needs to engage with the providers of all the services you rely on, from your calendar app to your Uber ride. Those providers must either partner with the company operating the assistant, or design their app to integrate with the assistant. So Spotify will stream music upon request via Alexa, and Honeywell's smart-home thermostat, via Assistant, will bump up the temperature 15 minutes before Grandma's expected arrival.

For providers, "if there is a competitive advantage to be gained, then absolutely they will do it," said Brett Sappington, senior director of research at market research firm Parks Associates.

From the article "One Bot To Rule Them All? Not Likely, With Apple, Google, Amazon And Microsoft Virtual Assistants" by Ethan Baron.

Previously In The News

Roku Shares Soar in Streaming-Device Maker’s IPO Debut

Roku faces massive, deep-pocketed competitors — but so far the 700-employee company has more than held its own in the streaming-media device market. In the first quarter of 2017, Roku had 37% share of...

Alphabet Inc Takes One More Step Toward Becoming a TV Powerhouse

The irony is that YouTube TV may well get the growth it’s seeking sooner than anybody expects. Late last year a Parks Associates survey determined that the nascent YouTube Red was consumers’ seventh-f...

Streaming TV Is Alphabet’s ‘One That Got Away’

Google’s Chromecast streaming-TV device didn’t lose ground, but given that it’s only utilized as a streaming TV device by 17% of streaming video viewers — despite launching in 2013 with considerably l...

Bloomberg Attacks Apple TV As Failing To Be "A Groundbreaking, iPhone-Caliber Product"

According to U.S. market research published by Parks Associates last summer, Amazon media player products narrowly out-shipped Apple TV (for a 22 vs 20 percent share of the market) in 2015, but that a...