(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) With digital assistants getting better at talking to other apps and completing tasks for users every day, Samsung Electronics is gearing up to make the second edition of its voice-powered personal assistant Bixby uniform across smart home devices starting next year.

Slated to launch in 2018, Bixby 2.0 will be 'ubiquitous', 'personalised' and an 'open' digital assistant, the company said.

The South Korean technology giant is focusing deeply on adding Bixby's artificial intelligence capabilities to various OS platforms including Tizen, to bridge the gap between uniformity of its personal assistant across smartphones, home speakers, refrigerators and televisions and also take on its rivals such as Google Assistant, Amazon's Alexa and Apple's Siri.

"We are developing multiple technologies such as authentication technology, and wake up technology which will make a task such as even waking up Bixby easier," Ji Soo Yi, vice-president of mobile communications business at Samsung Electronics, told IANS during a media interaction here.

Samsung's vision is to make the second iteration of Bixby a tool that becomes a daily part of everyone's life by learning more about the user and deliver personalised results, Ji said.

The company is making its digital assistant open source by giving developers the opportunity to choose and create their own software across application domains such as sports, food, entertainment and travel, which could increase the software's appeal.

"We are aiming to lift the bar [in respect to digital assistants] as much as possible. Based on our current architecture, we are very confident that we have lifted the bar with Bixby 2.0," he added.

However, the company has not announced when it will roll out Bixby 2.0 for its Tizen-based smartphones, and other line-up of devices.

Samsung debuted Bixby assistant on its flagship Galaxy S8 and S8+ smartphones earlier this year.

The smart assistant was introduced in India last month and has been optimised to understand Indian accent, Samsung India had earlier said.

Bixby's voice capabilities for Indian consumers were developed at the Samsung Research and Development Institute in Bengaluru, Samsung's largest R & D facility outside South Korea.

MENAFN2710201700490000ID1096003213