Rumors are beginning to circulate online surrounding an AI-related product release from Sonos being planned in September. The release is confirmed—that was stated by CEO and Director Thomas Conrad in an investor’s call—however, the exact details are still unknown, though, based on the call, it has been heavily implied that comes next will be AI-related, with Conrad stating it to be a core part of Sonos’s business strategy moving forward.
To quote Conrad directly: “The lasting value is going to be in what surrounds the model in a real home, the hardware that can converse with quality across every room, the system that already knows the shape of a home and the way a family lives in it, the connectivity to reach the speakers, services and devices that turn a request into coordinated action. That’s the operating environment for AI in the home, and Sonos has spent 20 years building it.”
What Else Is Known About the Sonos September Launch
The only other hint that’s been given on the new release’s direction is that Conrad specifically called out “conversational computing” and “predictive intelligence,” pointing expectations in the direction of AI being used to control and curate, likely leveraging the company’s existing voice assistant.
Janko Roettgers, in writing for his newsletter, Lowpass, seems to think there’s a possibility that this could extend into controlling other smart home products, but the evidence that exists for that today remains limited, with Philips Hue bulbs being the only major smart device able to be controlled through Sonos Voice Control exclusively.
Why Integrators Should Take Notice
Sonos’s push towards “conversational computing” comes at a time when others in the channel (like Josh.ai and Savant) are gunning for that same capability on their own platforms.
Of course, in an era of interoperability within the professional smart home sphere, one must wonder if at some point a Sonos-powered AI voice assistant may one day be used as a bridge to control other components of a smart home. For that matter: what does predictive intelligence mean for audio?
The September timing is interesting, given CEDIA Expo will be taking place then, however, given the nature of how this information was disseminated, it’s likely the September timing of the announcement is more a coincidence than a possible Expo reveal.
