14 DAY TRIAL // The battle for the best personal digital assistant is about to get fiercer, as Nokia is said to be working at such a feature for its Z Launcher application included in the N1 tablet.
The intelligent virtual assistant for the Z Launcher will be based on Desti's technology, a new report claims. According to a source familiar with Nokia's plans, the Finnish company is trying to improve its UI to become competitive on the market.
The addition of a digital assistant to its Z Launcher, the UI that powers the N1 tablet would be a major step forward for Nokia, which is expected to enter the smartphone market as early as 2016.
“Z Launcher is supposed to evolve into something much complex and a diverse product with AI capabilities beyond mere launcher app.
“Desti is a trip planner with AI and natural language processing capabilities. It comes from same lab where Siri was developed. So, Nokia has access to AI and language processing patents,” says the unnamed source.
From the team behind Apple's Siri
Nokia acquired Desti, a spin-off from the team that worked on Apple Siri, about a year ago. Rumors about a possible digital assistant for Nokia devices emerged soon after the acquisition was made public, but they died out pretty quickly.
Fast forward one year and it looks like those rumors might have been accurate since Nokia is now working to bring its first intelligent virtual assistant on the Z Launcher.
Unfortunately, it's hard to tell how long it will take Nokia to announce its new product since the latest rumors don't share any details on the status of the project.
The project might be in an advanced stage of development or Nokia might have just started working on the intelligent virtual assistant.
The important thing is that Nokia continues to innovate and remain relevant on the market, so fans should expect quite a few surprises from the Finnish company in the coming months.