Fast talker: Alexa may offer speedier answers with Amazon-made AI chips

Amazon wants to cut the lag time between your asking Alexa a question and the virtual assistant giving you an answer. According to a report by The Information, the online retailer is developing its own artificial intelligence chips to be used in Echo devices and other hardware. If successfully created and deployed, these AI chips would allow more voice-based requests to be processed on-device rather than going to the cloud. Currently, Alexa needs to contact the cloud to interpret commands. That's why there's a short delay after you ask the virtual assistant a question--she needs to analyze the command and gather an answer with help from the cloud.