What has Samsung done with Viv, voice assistant more advanced than its Bixby?

Samsung recently showed off its voice assistant Bixby, with cool features including image recognition. In a demo at the Note 8 launch event last month, a Samsung employee showed how he could ask Bixby to move a picture of pizza into his “food” folder.

The move was hailed by industry insiders, who said Viv had shown off technology in demos that seemed very promising.

Tim Baxter, Samsung’s president and chief executive in North America, said the company had been working on Bixby before it acquired Viv. He also said Viv brings different things to the table – and helps Samsung with its bigger ambitions for moving into the smart home and beyond.

So Bixby, it seems, is just the start for voice-controlled Samsung products. Viv specialises in work with services, such as social media, entertainment and others that are made by third parties, Baxter said.

It’s a big ambition, and one that Samsung is arguably a little late in pursuing openly. Amazon and Google are currently the dominant players in the home assistant world, with Amazon scooping up 70 per cent of the voice-enabled speaker market, according to eMarketer. The retail giant is expected to keep command of that market for a while, thanks to its expanding line of Echo devices.

Samsung’s new personal digital assistant Bixby faces a few tough challenges