By land and by air, Amazon’s new mission seems to be filling the house of screens, cameras and microphones.
In a virtual event held at Seattle headquarters, the company has presented its devices catalog for this fall, which includes several smart screens and speakers or safety devices, but also some surprises such as the first robot designed for the home
and a completely autonomous drone that monitors the house when the owners are not.
Baptized as Astro, Amazon’s first robot is an intelligent screen similar to ECHO SHOW devices, with access to the Alexa virtual assistant and able to display relevant information for the user as news, upcoming appointments in the calendar, traffic status or the
time you are going to do.
The difference is that now the screen has wheels and moves through the house.
You may be ordered to send messages to other family members or that go to a specific room carrying a small object or one or two cans of soda.
The robot moves at a speed of one meter per second and can recognize different people.
It is also equipped with a 12 megapixel camera with a telescopic system that can be raised to hold videoconferences, although the screen is always at ground level.
The robot will cost $ 999 (about 860 euros to current change) but will only be available in a limited manner in the USA. And the company still does not know if the product will end up becoming a commercial product.
The first units will be delivered at the end of this year.
Something similar happens with the Ring Always Home Cam, a product that Apple had already anticipated last year but now seems to be ready to get to the market.
It is a security dron designed to monitor the home.
When it is not in use it rests on a load base, but it can be programmed to patrol the hallways and rooms when there is no one at home.
This flying camera is somewhat cheaper than Astro, but also more limited (it is limited to showing the image, live, what happens at home).
Amazon will begin selling it in limited quantities this same month at a price of $ 250 (about 215 euros) and as well as Astro, only in the USA. Initially.
Another product that Amazon had already shown but that seems ready to get to the market definitively is the smart halo bracelet.
The proposal shown last year was that of a bracelet without a screen but with a microphone and associated with a subscription service that offered users with a whole vision of their daily activity index and health advice.
This year’s version has changed something in its approach, but in essence it is the same product only that now has a screen and Amazon has eliminated the microphone.
In both cases, it is associated with an annual subscription service that includes nutrition tips, a complete view of the activity, not only performance data, and, now, virtual fitness classes.
Halo View will cost $ 80 (70 euros) and will be available at the end of this year.
The subscription at the service costs about 3 euros a month, approximately.
The other surprise of the event, which will also be available only in a limited way at first, is Echo Glow, a videoconference device designed for children and an educational component.
In addition to having a screen, Echo Glow tempts an interactive projector that can project different educational activities or stories on the table.
Children can interact with projections with their hands as if they were a touch screen.
Amazon will create games, interactive stories and artistic applications for this new product, but it will also allow third parties developers such as Disney, Nickelodeon, Mattel and Sesame Workshop, schedule educational apps and games with their best known characters.
Glow will have an approximate price of $ 300 (260 euros to change) when it comes out on sale, although those who want to prove it during the beta phase will pay only 249 dollars (about 215 euros).
The rest of the novelties of Amazon will be available during the coming months and many will arrive in Spain.
The company, for example, has presented a new version of its 15-inch size Echo Show screen.
This screen can be based on any surface with a lectern, but also hanging from the wall in vertical or landscape format, and includes a camera for videoconference.
You will be able to recognize who is the person who is watching and show personalized information.
The device will cost 250 euros in Europe and will arrive over the next few months.
Amazon will also release soon in our country the Blink Video Doorbell, a HD videotamient with quite economic bidirectional audio, with a price of 60 euros, and the new range of WiFi Eero Pro 6 routers, with support for WiFi 6.
