Global Voice Assistant Wearables, Headphones to Top 100 Million Units by 2021, Says Futuresource

Voice assistants are on course to be a major user interface over the next two to three years, said a Thursday Futuresource report. Smart speakers were more than half of the 49.6 million voice-assistant devices shipped worldwide last year, and the technology -- from Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft -- has expanded to media streamers, consoles, smart TVs and wearables, it said. The research firm forecasts more than 100 million voice assistant-enabled products globally by 2021, with headphones, smart home hubs, networking gear and set-top boxes added to the mix. It predicts more devices supporting far-field mics will hit the market this year. Futuresource estimates Google Assistant will catch up to Amazon's Alexa over the next two years, but the two companies will be challenged in China, it said. Alibaba and Baidu have invested heavily in artificial intelligence, having released first products in 2017 and tailoring products to markets outside their domestic base, Futuresource said. Naver in South Korea and Line in Japan are following similar paths, it said. Some brands are using voice assistants to build a unified experience across multiple devices in a specific room such as a kitchen, a strategy that could extend to education and enterprise, it said.