LG perhaps has given smartphones a totally new direction with the webOS. The most interesting thing, as of now, this webOS offers for smart TVs is its ability to speak to Amazon’s Alexa without even having an Alexa-powered speaker.
LG has taken a new direction even earlier this year. The company went from being just a smart TV manufacturer to a developer and distributor of a smart TV platform. What LG had decided to do was to license its own webOS TV to other companies that manufacture smart TV makers. The company never thought of licensing the OS as something that would give them tough competition since many of the companies involved are already engaged in different markets or on different tiers.
However, this does not mean that the webOS TV of LG’s smart TVs and webOS TV on third-party TVs are the same things. For the third-party TVs, many of the features of the webOS would not be available which will remain exclusive to LGs own products. But one of these exclusive features will finally be available on third-party TVs as well, that is non-LG webOS TVs will soon be able to speak with Alexa provided that they have one required piece of equipment other than the TV.
The Alexa interaction on webOS TV takes place through LG’s Magic Remote. The TV remote allows the TV owners simply to speak or command Alexa to open apps, or change channels, or even control some of the smart home appliances. Alexa, in turn, will respond through both audio and visual feedback on the smart TV.
The tech giant has mentioned that the Alexa integration will be available this quarter this year through an over-the-air update for third-party webOS TVs. The integration will start off with the US, followed by Europe and Asia.
