AI is entering our everyday lives. We can ask a computer to order a pair of Converse sneakers, book a hotel, or schedule a romantic dinner with our spouse. Shouldn't we also be able to pay for stuff with our voices? Industries from eCommerce to banking harness voice technologies with every new piece of software released. Voice-enabled virtual assistants gain more recognition each year, and the financial sector is among the top beneficiaries of this innovation.

Voice-enabled assistants are the newest buzz among consumers across industries with Google, Amazon, Apple, and other giants rolling out AI-infused gears functioning primarily through conversational voice interfaces. Globally, the number of customers using voice-assistants is increasing with a CAGR of 29.4% and is estimated to reach 1.83 billion by 2021. Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant have all become an integral part of a millennial's day. From setting up reminders, checking the weather, to shopping – these voice-enabled digital assistants have covered most of the bases heavily influencing the mobile-tech experience. Financial services have been one of the biggest beneficiaries of such innovations around mobile tech and IoT.

This story was delivered to BI Intelligence IoT Briefing subscribers. To learn more and subscribe, please click here. Anker, a hardware accessory manufacturer, will introduce a new, Echo Dot-sized smart speaker with Amazon's Alexa voice assistant built in, according to The Verge. The new speaker, which will go on sale August 16 for $35, will give consumers a new way to add an Alexa-enabled speaker to their homes and is an early example of Amazon's plan to move Alexa beyond just its own hardware. Amazon is looking to make Alexa widely available to give consumers a wide variety of device options.

The introduction of new voice-driven digital assistants has captured the imagination of consumers and businesses alike. As more developers build capabilities for these devices, consumers will increase usage, providing the springboard for integration with digital banking solutions such as voice-driven payments. It is becoming clear that the next battle in the tech world will be around voice-driven digital assistants, such as the Apple Siri, Amazon Alexa, Microsoft Cortana, Google Assistant/Now and Samsung Bixby/Viv. While the attention has moved from smartphone assistants to home hubs, the real excitement will begin as the underlying AI (artificial intelligence) and machine learning begins to deliver detailed, contextual, and highly personalized responses that will make a consumer's life easier. Digital assistants will be at the heart of a user's daily activities, whether in an increasingly smart home (using home hub devices like the Amazon Echo and Dot, Google Home, Apple HomePod), a connected car, at work or walking down the street.

Is Google aware that Voice First devices will break the pay-per-click business model? "…one thing that we are all clear about is the days of three top text ads followed by ten organic results is a thing of the past in the voice first world"-- Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice president of advertising and commerce, November 29, 2016 During an investor call [3] on November 29, 2016 Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice President of Advertising and Commerce at Google, spoke to the coming shift of their business model as voice first device interactions begin to dominate our lives. Web-based search will never fully disappear, but a generation of kids are growing up around the Voice First revolution and fully expect a computer to be something they talk to and talks back. Just like this generation now no longer has CDs, DVDs, tapes or records, the next generation will expect voice interaction, not with pages of search results but AI assisted, ontology, and taxonomy perfect answers, most particularly one answer. You and I will not tolerate radio-like advertisements, nor would we tolerate a telephone-like IVR list of advertisers.

"...one thing that we are all clear about is the days of three top text ads followed by ten organic results is a thing of the past in the voice first world"-- Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice president of advertising and commerce, November 29, 2016 During an investor call [3] on November 29, 2016 Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice president of advertising and commerce at Google spoke to the coming shift of their business model as voice first device interactions begin to dominate our lives. Web based search will never fully disappear, but a generation of kids are growing up around the Voice First revolution and fully expect a computer to be something they talk to and talks back. Just like this generation now no longer has CDs, DVDs, Tapes or Records, the next generation will expect Voice interaction, not with pages of search results but AI assisted, ontology and taxonomy perfect answers, most particularly one answer. You and I will not tolerate radio-like advertisements, nor would we tolerate a telephone-like IVR list of advertisers. Thus, the writing is on the wall.

Is Google aware that Voice First devices will break the pay-per-click business model? "…one thing that we are all clear about is the days of three top text ads followed by ten organic results is a thing of the past in the voice first world"-- Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice president of advertising and commerce, November 29, 2016 During an investor call [3] on November 29, 2016 Sridhar Ramaswamy, Senior Vice President of Advertising and Commerce at Google, spoke to the coming shift of their business model as voice first device interactions begin to dominate our lives. Web-based search will never fully disappear, but a generation of kids are growing up around the Voice First revolution and fully expect a computer to be something they talk to and talks back. Just like this generation now no longer has CDs, DVDs, tapes or records, the next generation will expect voice interaction, not with pages of search results but AI assisted, ontology, and taxonomy perfect answers, most particularly one answer. You and I will not tolerate radio-like advertisements, nor would we tolerate a telephone-like IVR list of advertisers.

Advances in technology are setting the stage for financial institutions to explore use cases that take advantage of a consumer's most natural communication method ... the voice. It wasn't so long ago that we were amazed that we interact with an IVR to solve basic customer service issues or that we could type on a piece of glass to communicate with our mobile device. The problem was that most IVR systems didn't learn about our needs over time and typing and gesturing is really not the most efficient way to interact with a computer or device for the vastly most common uses most people have. Even for the most basic routines require far more physical and mental effort than what should be required in today's digital age. What if each time you needed to reach out to your bank (or any other business) the organization remembered your entire history of interactions (needs, behaviors, preferences, transaction patterns and timing, etc.), allowing it to have an intelligent'conversation' without going over often repeated steps?

The secret to Viv is the system actually writes it's own code. In contrast to any other similar system, It is a profound and monumental giant leap forward. The structure of the Voice First world is held together by Intelligent Agents. Intelligent Agents use AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) to decode volition and intent from an analyzed phrase or sentence. The AI in most current generation systems like Siri, Echo and Cortana focuses on speaker independent word recognition and to some extent the intent of predefined words or phrases that have a hard coded connection to a domain expertise.