Intel Could Be Bringing Always-On Voice Assistants to Laptops

Always-on digital assistants like "Hey Siri" and "OK Google" add an important layer of simplicity, but thus far they've not made it to laptops, mostly due to battery reasons. A new Intel partnership with Sensory is hoping to solve that. The problem with always-on voice recognition is that it requires the device to always be listening. That's at odds with the sleep functions that are so important to preserving battery life on modern laptops, so thus far, always-on assistants have for the most part stayed on smartphones. Intel's aiming to change that, thanks to a partnership with Sensory that could see customized low-power voice recognition chips coming to any Intel-powered laptop.