Microsoft and Amazon launch Alexa-Cortana public preview for Echo speakers and Windows 10 PCs

Microsoft and Amazon will bring Alexa and Cortana to all Echo speakers and Windows 10 users in the U.S. today. As part of a partnership between the Seattle-area tech giants, you can say "Hey Cortana, open Alexa" to Windows 10 PCs and "Alexa, open Cortana" to a range of Echo smart speakers. The public preview bringing the most popular AI assistant on PCs together with the smart speaker with the largest U.S. market share will be available to most people today but will be rolled out to all users in the country over the course of the next week, a Microsoft spokesperson told VentureBeat in an email. Each of the assistants brings unique features to the table. Cortana, for example, can schedule a meeting with Outlook, create location-based reminders, or draw on LinkedIn to tell you about people in your next meeting.