Adoption of Smart Speakers... fast followers

"Fast followers" is an important concept when watching consumer electronics.

New products happen usually this way: Someone sticks their neck out and takes a chance...

...the herd watches to see if the pioneer thrives... or is eaten by predators... or falls off a cliff...

... if the pioneer thrives, the rest of the herd follows in a stampede.

This happened with cell phones, personal computers, smart phones & tablet computers. (The first smart screens) and with Smart speakers

Check out "Smart Speakers."

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Wikipedia

Release date	November 6, 2014

Amazon had been developing Echo devices inside its Lab126 offices in Silicon Valley and Cambridge, Massachusetts since at least 2010 in confirmed reports. The device was part of Amazon’s first attempts to expand its device portfolio beyond the Kindle e-reader.^[3] The Echo was prominently featured in Amazon's first-ever Super Bowl ad in 2016.^[4]

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Wikipedia
Google Home is a brand of smart speakers developed by Google. The first device was announced in May 2016 and released in the United States in November 2016, with subsequent releases globally throughout 2017.


Now, there are 107 Smart Speakers in Consumer Reports List

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A quick trip down memory land for "tablet computers." Do you remember the "Grid Pad?" Palm Pilot? Apple Newton? Pocket PC? All these runs at it since the late 1980's and early 1990's before the concept finally got traction -- when the technology was good enough to inspire mass adoption.  Early Tablet Computers 

With the iPad it passed the "anyone can use it" threshold.

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We have had the first SMART Screens. They are tablet computers. We have had the first smart speakers (voice activated personal assistants.)

Combining the technology -- the adoption rate of this is going to be very rapid. It takes something we're used to, (Tablet computers) and combines it with something most of us are getting used to (Smart speakers) to increase the utility dramatically.

Google has telegraphed that "smart screens" are coming. With the smart speaker combined with a screen and voice activation.  

Some of their partners in this are also partners with MicroVision. (Goertek and particularly RockChip -- here) Yes, on the WPG Holdings list of "hottest" items is a MicroVision projector engine combined with the RockChip processor dedicated to voice recognition. (Unfortunately, they close their site for Chinese New year. ) 

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Over the weekend I met someone who carries a Motorola phone with the projector mod. She loves it, uses it at work(for work) and at home and while out and about.

However it's use case is a lot like an early tablet computer. It's not convenient technology. It's power hungry, not very bright, and requires playing with a particularly finicky (technical term!) focus wheel. It's not convenient and easy for just anyone to use. 

Projection in smartphones has now reached that all-important threshold. Ragentek has the "anyone can use it" projector smartphone.

...and a lot of interest in lasers... by some companies playing with near-eye displays.

Apple.... multiple downgrades.

I've noted it here before.... 
Apple's $500 upgrade allows you to make a poop emoji take on your own expression. 

This is a $500 Upgrade
The phones go fast enough for everyone already, and most of the new features are things other people have done. So they slow their old phones down to encourage upgrades. (no such problems in the Android world.)
There is a very nice new feature they could add.... and they could deliver it for less than $500...

No idea if they're onboard yet, but this is the time we can start looking for "fast followers."

CNBC

IPhone demand will disappoint this year, according to another Wall Street analyst.

Atlantic Equities lowered its rating for Apple shares to neutral from overweight on Monday, predicting weaker-than-expected sales for the company's March quarter. This follows a downgrade of the popular stock last week by Longbow Research.

We see "signs that iPhone demand is starting to soften, limited visibility into the potential for future iPhone cycles and emerging challenges to the smartphone's dominance at the centre of consumer technology, we believe the stock's multiple will compress, limiting upside potential," analyst James Cordwell wrote in a note to clients. We are "lowering our March qtr revenue estimates and are now below consensus for Q2-Q418."

The Fear Motivation of the Modern CEO

I once had the good fortune to be able to chat with a mover in the consumer electronics field.

One of the things I was told during that event is that most of the CEO's -- the movers and decision makers in consumer electronics have very little courage to do anything new. This was echoed in a way by Mr. Tokman during the ASM, when he mentioned that all the companies want to be "fast followers." 

When other company finds something new that catches hold, then everyone will know where they want to be -- they'll find something that they can improve or adjust for their own audience, and they'll pile in.

We've seen this before with cameras in cell phones, with smart phones, with Amazon Echo style devices -- how long did Amazon have to sit on that out of fear, and then suddenly Apple, Google and others pile into the space.

They are fast followers.

Now, of course, I would have preferred to have PicoP in the Motorola attachable pico projector that was announced yesterday -- but that is the kind of thing that will start the fast follower stampede.

And the fast follower stampede in portable projection favors MicroVision in every way. PicoP is brighter, higher resolution, much higher contrast, lower power consumption, smaller, has infinite focus -- and it's already embedded in a phone?

In the Motorola device, or not in it -- the more they promote it, the better for us.

What's our competition?  I guess what comes naturally with PicoP is too much to ask for them.