By Nicole Nguyen
Google announced a new generation of mobile and smart-home
products on Wednesday including two 5G-capable Pixel smartphones,
the rebranded flagship smart speaker Nest Audio and the first
Chromecast streaming-media player to come with a remote control.
The player will be the first to feature a redesigned on-screen
interface branded Google TV.
As with most Google-developed devices, these new, relatively
affordable products put software -- particularly
artificial-intelligence features -- over hardware. Google's gadget
update comes on the heels of similar hardware events from Amazon
and Apple, all prerecorded without a live audience in the year of
Covid-19.
While Google develops the most popular operating system in the
world, Android, its share of the hardware market is relatively
small compared with its competitors. Its own phones rank globally
well behind the likes of Huawei, Samsung, Xiaomi, Oppo and Apple.
The smart speaker space is dominated by Amazon's Echo, with 69.7%
market share, compared with Google's 31.7%, as measured by
eMarketer.
And Chromecast makes up just 3% of the streaming device market,
while Android TV, Google's smart TV operating system, powers 4% of
TVs and set-top boxes, says Strategy Analytics.
Still, Google's parent company, Alphabet Inc., called its
hardware efforts a "multi-billion dollar business" in a February
2020 earnings call. The company groups its gadget business in the
"Other" category of its financial sheet, which also includes
subscription services like YouTube Premium and in-app Google Play
purchases. In 2019, that category brought Google $17 billion in
revenue.
The event's focus was affordability. "The world doesn't need
another $1,000 phone," Google hardware chief, Rick Osterloh, said
in a call with reporters. He said the company aimed to offer value,
rather than cutting-edge technology. The pandemic-prompted economic
downturn "exaggerated our point of view," he added.
While we plan to test the new devices in coming weeks, here's a
first glance:
Pixel 5 and Pixel 4a 5G
Google is upgrading its latest Pixel phone line with 5G
connectivity, which can provide blazing fast speeds -- if you're in
exactly the right spot, as my colleague Joanna Stern reported.
At $699, Google's flagship smartphone, the Pixel 5, is priced
lower than competitors from Samsung and Apple, which is due to
refresh its iPhone line this fall. The Pixel 5 is thinner than last
year's model, but has a bigger battery, faster wireless charging
and reverse wireless charging, so you can top up other Qi-enabled
devices, like Google's Pixel Buds.
Great battery life wasn't always a Pixel hallmark. Hopefully
that changes this time around. Google also added an "extreme
battery saver" feature, which it says can prolong a charge to up to
48 hours. You choose the essential apps you want to keep on, while
everything else is paused. The Pixel 5 is also faster, with 8
gigabytes of RAM, up from the Pixel 4's 6 gigabytes.
The fifth-gen phone adds an ultrawide camera, replacing the
optical telephoto camera in last year's Pixel 4. We tend to prefer
telephoto, for zooming in, so this isn't necessarily a good thing.
What does sound promising: The phone's lowlight capture feature,
Night Sight, is now available in Portrait mode. You can edit photos
with a new feature called Portrait Light, which uses AI to change
the front lighting angle of portrait pictures, even ones you took
on older phones. The Pixel 5 also comes with software-powered video
stabilization.
One of the features I'm most excited about is Hold for Me,
powered by Google Assistant. When you're stuck on hold and have a
long wait, it's supposed to sit on the line for you, then notify
you when a real human picks up. Pixel phones already have other AI
features like this, including call screening, car crash detection
and live audio transcription.
Not all of the Pixel 5's key features are upgrades. The Pixel 4
had facial-recognition unlock; the Pixel 5 reverts to a fingerprint
sensor. And the phone's processor, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G, is
rated slower than the chipset in last year's model.
The Pixel 4a, Google's midrange budget phone, now comes in a 5G
version priced at $499. It has the same two-camera system as the
Pixel 5, but not the water resistance and other premium
features.
Pixel 4a 5G will be available on Oct. 15, and Pixel 5 will be
available on Oct. 29.
Nest Audio
Google is replacing its original Google Home smart speaker with
the $99 Nest Audio, available Oct. 15. The HomePod-esque
fabric-covered tower has 50% more bass and 75% more volume than the
original Google Home smart speaker first released in 2016.
Nest Audio joins Google's puck-sized $50 Nest Mini in the
company's lineup of speakers powered by Google Assistant. It's
shaping up to be a year for new smart-speaker designs: Amazon just
refreshed its $99 Echo with a spherical look. No word yet on
whether Apple will soon update its aging HomePod.
With other midrange 5G phones available from other phone makers,
and the latest iPhones due soon, IDC devices analyst Francisco
Jeronimo expects the Pixel to become a harder sell for Google, even
at the lower price. However, he expects the new Nest Audio speaker
to become a top seller this holiday season. "We have seen very
strong growth in the smart speaker space and Google has been
catching up to Amazon," he said.
Chromecast with Google TV
At its debut, the Chromecast was heralded as a great budget way
to stream video from your phone to a TV. But streaming sticks from
Roku and Amazon all but knocked it out of the running. Their
advantage? Remote controls. This year, the Chromecast finally comes
with a remote, which includes a dedicated button for Google
Assistant voice search, as well as shortcuts to YouTube and
Netflix.
The new Chromecast, still a pebble-shaped gadget that plugs into
your TV's HDMI port, can display video in up to 4K HDR at 60 frames
per second. The new Chromecast costs $50 and is now available in
the U.S. (and for preorder in other countries).
On screen, it gets a whole new Google TV interface, not to be
confused with Android TV...or the Google TV that came before
Android TV.
This updated design includes a personalized "For you" experience
that pulls content from across your subscriptions and watch list
items from Google Search. If you have a YouTube TV subscription, it
also has a Live TV tab showing what's currently playing.
Integration with other TV providers is coming soon.
Google TV is now replacing the Google Play Movies & TV app
on Android mobile devices and will be available on Sony and other
Android TV OS hardware partners starting in 2021.
--
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
September 30, 2020 17:00 ET (21:00 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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