There could be a new, incredibly ambitious Essential device shown at CES 2019
- An anonymous informant reports Andy Rubin and Essential are working on a new AI-centric device.
- Although unlikely to be an Essential Phone 2, the new device will have smartphone-related functions.
- According to the informant, it is possible we will see this wild new Essential phone/device at CES 2019 in January.
Earlier this year, the Android world was stunned to find out Essential — the company started by the father of Android, Andy Rubin, which released the innovative Essential Phone — would not release an Essential Phone 2 and was, in fact, planning to sell the company.
However, things may have turned around at Essential, as a new Bloomberg report suggests the company is working on a new, wildly ambitious device which uses artificial intelligence to replace and/or augment your current smartphone.
The source of this information is an anonymous informant who claims to have a working knowledge of internal happenings at Essential. As such, take the information with a very large grain of salt.
According to the informant, Rubin and his team canceled work on the expected Essential smart speaker to focus instead on a completely new device — not only new for Essential, but new for the entire smartphone industry.
As the source describes it, the device would be like a smartphone but smaller, and it would use AI and voice commands to take care of menial day-to-day tasks you perform on your phone. This would include answering text messages, booking appointments, sending/responding to emails, etc. You could also use the device to make phone calls.
From the sounds of it, it seems like this device would basically be Google Duplex boxed into a smartphone-like product.
The source says that it is possible Rubin and the Essential team will show off a prototype of this mysterious device at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January next year.
This news, of course, begs a new question: is Essential not down for the count and continuing on? The news a few months ago made it seem the company was finished and looking to offload its assets to someone else. Maybe that’s not the case.
What do you think? Let us know your theories and opinions in the comments!
NEXT: Essential talks notch settings, Android Q, and more in latest Reddit AMA
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