In an attempt to reorganize its assistant unit, Google plans to leverage the recent improvements in generative AI to supercharge its smart assistant. Google Assistant is Google’s seven-year-old virtual assistant software similar to Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri.
Peeyush Ranjan, Vice President of Google, communicated the reorganization plan to employees via an email on Monday. The initiative involves laying off some workers, signaling a shift in focus towards a more efficient and intelligent Assistant LLM technology-powered system. The objective is to deliver top-notch product experiences to users and redefine the way virtual assistants interact with individuals.
“We’ve seen the profound potential of generative AI to transform people’s lives and see a huge opportunity to explore what a supercharged Assistant, powered by the LLM technology, would look like.”
Vice President of Google, Peeyush Ranjan on supercharging Google Assistant
He added that some members of the team have started making efforts toward the reorganisation. Although it is unclear how many members of the team will be laid off, those affected will be given about 60 days to look for other employment opportunities within Google.
The executives, as a part of the new development, have also announced several changes to the Speech team–the team in charge of voice commands. Beaufays Francoise, the head of Speech, will now work with Sissie Hsiao, the head of Assistant and Bard. According to the assistant executives, the changes will allow the division to move with focus and speed.
Google building on the fast-rising generative AI
The fast growth of generative AI has influenced Google to incorporate the technology into many of its products, especially with its ability to respond to text-based questions with intelligent and well-structured answers.
The reorganization comes after Google introduced a major update to Bard last month which allows the chatbot to respond to prompts by talking.
Although Google has not specified the new features that will come with Assistant, many expect that embedding generative AI will help Assistant’s interaction to be less robotic
Photo Credit: Mitchell Luo(Unsplash)
