What makes voice AI products hard to design?

Josh Elman

Director of Product Management · Apple

Earning Trust

Josh Elman says the hard part is earning trust: an assistant must do a few things well and earn the right to do more, because claiming to handle everything means it won't be trusted.

The answer starts at 36:14.

Dilani Kahawala

Co-Founder and CEO

Reliability, Interface, User Education

Dilani Kahawala says reliability, the interface, and teaching users to work with an agent are the three biggest challenges, because consumers don't have patience for an assistant getting things wrong.

Arpan Podduturi

VP Product · Samsara

Interruption Problem

Arpan Podduturi says they have an interruption or barge-in problem to work through, because their dash cams lack echo cancellation so the mic mutes while the agent talks.

Sushil Kumar

CEO · Cyara

Confident Mistakes

Sushil Kumar says the most challenging thing about AI is that it sounds natural but makes mistakes confidently; you need to understand its limitations and plan for them.

Keith Zubchevich

President & CEO · Conviva

Human Language Variability

Keith Zubchevich says the biggest challenge is human variability: people speak differently and ask the same questions differently, so the agent has to learn all the variability of human nature.