Amazon is doubling-down on Alexa today, with their announcement that they are giving out $100 in monthly bill credits for AWS (Amazon Web Services) to developers who are developing Alexa Skills. This is important because it allows Amazon to incentivize developers to come and build more skills for Alexa and make the voice assistant even better, but it also means that developers won’t have as much overhead for developing for Alexa. Currently, developers don’t have any way to make money from their Alexa skills, so this is going to help out some developers, but it still doesn’t give them any revenue. Amazon did note that many developers were using the free tier of AWS already for their Alexa Skills, but now with this new monthly bill credit, it’ll cover developers in case their usage goes over those limits.
Alexa is the next big thing for Amazon, and it’s actually where they are beating Google right now. Alexa has been going head-to-head with the Google Assistant and Google Home, but due to Amazon’s massive head start in this space, Alexa is much further ahead than the Google Assistant right now. Of course, that’s going to change, but Amazon is doing what they can to continue to beat Google Assistant, and not become complacent, which is a good thing. Alexa is already integrated into many devices, including Ford’s lineup of vehicles, but also LG’s newest refrigerator that they showed off at CES in January.
Those developers out there that have been wanting to start developing for Alexa, this is definitely a great time to get started. There are already thousands of great skills available for Alexa, with plenty more coming every day. Amazon has also noted that they are planning to debut even more Alexa-powered hardware, in addition to the handful they have already. Like the Amazon Echo, Echo Dot and Amazon Tap. There’s also the Fire tablet range as well as the Fire TV and many third-party hardware products with Alexa built-in. You can find out more details about this AWS offer from Amazon by hitting up the source link down below.