Virtual assistants expected to top virtual reality in holiday sales
A man plays a video game with the Oculus Rift VR headset at the E3 Electronic Expo in Los Angeles, California, U.S. on June 14, 2016. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson/File Photo
VIRTUAL REALITY
After dubbing virtual reality as the "next mega tech theme" in a May 2015 industry report, brokerage Piper Jaffray will cut its 2016 estimate for sales of VR headsets by 65 percent to 2.2 million units in an as yet unpublished report.
Sales of high-end VR headsets including Facebook Inc's (FB.O) $599 Oculus Rift and Sony Corp's (6758.T) $399 PlayStation VR headset altogether will be about 300,000, reflecting supply constraints at Sony and the technological reality of Oculus and HTC Corp's (2498.TW) $799 Vive: only about 6 million to 7 million computers globally can run the software, said Paul Lee of Deloitte UK.
VIRTUAL ASSISTANTS
Two years after Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) introduced the Echo, a $179.99 hands free speaker with AI-powered virtual assistant Alexa, the virtual home assistant category is poised to beat out virtual reality and possibly a few other high tech competitors, according to the Consumer Technology Association.
Oppenheimer analyst Andrew Uerkwitz estimated nearly 10 million to 12 million Amazon Echo and Google Home virtual assistants could sell during the holidays.
"Personal assistants are going to blow VR out of the water," he said.
Google launched its $129 Home assistant in time for the holidays, but the $39.99 price of the Echo Dot-a miniaturized version of the original- and a list of features two years in the making give the Echo the edge this year, said Tractica analyst Mark Beccue.