Newsletter 
Google already has more than one messaging app available, with both Hangouts and Messenger out in the Play Store and having been live for a while. Now, a new report suggests that Google is working on bringing a new messaging app to Android which will make use of its intelligent machine learning technology, and allow users to communicate with a chatbot to find results to search queries. It would also allow for communication between friends and family similar to any other messaging app, likely to take on the current most popular option out there for the space, which is Facebook’s Messenger application.
As an example of how the technology will work, users could be having a conversation with a friend, and upon being asked a question they don’t know the answer to, could message a chat bot which could then search the web as well as other resources to find the answer, and message the user back with the result. Users could then take that answer and give it back to the original person who asked the question. Granted this is just one possible scenario of how the app could be used, but having the capability to search for things and get intelligent results like you were having a conversation with a real person, and have it all lumped into one app that is centered around messaging is an interesting take on how to best compete with messaging rivals that arguably offer more features than Google’s current offerings.
At the moment, Google has not confirmed the actual existence of this app/service, and unfortunately, there are no rumored details on the name or the launch date of the new messaging application. What is known is that long-time Google employee Nick Fox is heading up the project and is said to have been doing so for at least the past 12 months. Why this is significant is because Fox attempted to acquire a company who builds chatbots called 200 Labs just a couple of months ago. Although the acquisition never happened, it displays that Google had shown interest in a type of technology which is rumored to be in this messaging service due to hit mobile devices sometime in the future. By incorporating a chatbot into a new messaging app that likely relies heavily on Google search to grab the information being requested, Google also bolsters the number of users essentially accessing their search technology to find information.