Bixby could be the name of Samsung’s personal assistant in the Galaxy S8
Samsung has a lot riding on the success of the Galaxy S8, thanks to the Galaxy Note 7 disaster. They’re under more pressure than ever to perform alongside Apple and now Google, who has tossed its hat into the ring with its Pixel phones that bring an AI assistant unlike anything we’ve seen available in smartphones to date. Because of this, Samsung’s assistant must be compelling to pull people away from Google Assistant and Siri.
A few months ago the company bought Viv Labs, which was founded by some of the same people who created Siri for Apple. This acquisition is interesting because the company has an open artificial intelligence platform that allows third-party developers to build conversational assistants using a natural language interface. Now it’s rumored that the Galaxy S8 will make use of this technology.
A new trademark suggests this assistant could be called Bixby, as the application says the branding will be used for “computer software for personal information management” and “software used to operate voice recognition system enabling hands-free use through voice recognition.”
While the trademark doesn’t explicitly say that Bixby is the name of this virtual assistant that’s being described, it wouldn’t be too big of a leap to make. Nevertheless, we’ll classify this as a grain of salt rumor until we get more confirmation about the Galaxy S8 in a few months.