Snips Debuts Voice-Activated In-Vehicle SDK

Snips, the French startup with a voice assistant software developer kit (SDK), is showing off its technology through a voice-activated assistant embedded in a vehicle.

According to news from TechCrunch, Snips’ SDK is different from Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assistant because the system’s developers built with Snips run locally, not out to a cloud server to pull information. In this way, the voice command protects a user’s privacy while offering up a new use case: vehicles.

In the demo, Snips showed off a car that can give the driver an estimated time of arrival, call a contact or go to an address the driver instructs it to via voice. The report noted Snips is adding more languages to its voice recognition platform that it wants customers to embed into their products. TechCrunch said developers can build Snips voice-powered digital assistants that understand English, French and German.

The French startup isn’t the only company bringing voice technology to vehicles. In late December, a report surfaced that South Korean vehicle manufacturers Hyundai and Kia Motors are gearing up to add artificial intelligence (AI) to their cars beginning in 2019. According to a report by etNews.com at the time, the two car companies are planning to work with domestic and foreign companies to apply voice recognition-enabled, AI-powered digital assistants to their vehicles. These AI-powered assistants would be able to recognize natural language inside the car’s cabin.

According to high-ranking officials from Hyundai Motor Group, the plan is to have all of the company’s cars connected by 2025. The first Hyundai car enabled with connected functions will be the new Veloster, set for release in January of 2019. In the past, connected features were reserved only for high-end vehicles via BlueLink and UVO services.