Now that Amazon Echo is officially launched in the market as a smart home device, some companies are looking to create something similar with a bit of difference in technology. And this is not just “another” company. We are talking about Mattel, the world’s largest toymaker company here. Samsung has come up with Amazon Echo like device, but this is just for kids. The device is called Aristotle.
Mattel’s Aristotle is the Amazon Echo like smart home device that is almost a kindergarten teacher to the children. The device can interact and perform a lot of functions to deal with children.
The Mattel’s Aristotle will be there in the US stores somewhere in June of 2017. It will come at a price of $300. It is just for kids and toddlers. But if you compare the price of Amazon Echo, it costs $180, and the Google Home comes at $130. Now that being said, you won’t have the particular functionalities and features for kids from the Amazon Echo or Google Home.
The price gap can be irrelevant to you if you come to know about the specifications and features of this device. Mattel’s Aristotle comes with a lot. You will get a camera that acts as the smart baby monitor, and it checks the movements of the children. The device can also recognize objects within the environment, and that also includes the Mattel toys.
What makes it different?
The best feature of Mattel’s Aristotle is it can understand the speech of young children. And this is what the other two smart home devices cannot do at all. According to Robb Fujioka, the spokesperson of Mattel, this feature is a core facility that they tried to resolve right from the start so that they can make a unique device. He also said:
And to do this, Mattel’s Aristotle relies on a private voice training facility. It involves the children reciting/narrating a paragraph to Aristotle so that the device can understand the kids better. There are two voices within Aristotle. The first factor is called “Child Mode.” It has got the voice of a 25-year-old lady kindergarten teacher.
It allows the child in interacting with the device, starting from playing games with your kids to telling stories. There is one more voice, and that is called “parent mode.” It will help the parents to control the device, order baby products like diapers, medicines, and any other article.
This device will have its app too where you will get more features. You can use Mattel’s Aristotle as the nightlight. The device can light up with different colors, play songs, set a timer to train your kids with individual sleeping patterns. The company has worked with Qualcomm and Microsoft for both the hardware and software aspects.
The Aristotle is a beginning of a trend; this will open up for third party developers like Alexa. But this factor can also create ways for privacy issues which is critical when it comes to children’s activities.
According to Mattel, it delivers encrypted feed to your mobile phone through the cloud. Even if Aristotle has got better security features, we will not know exactly about it till it launches in June. The microphones can still allow collecting a lot of data on its users. On the positive aspect, the Mattel’s Aristotle represents a natural evolution of young children that can interact with technology
