Amazon grows Echo’s global reach with expansion to Asia – CNET

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The new Echo Plus.

Ry Crist/CNET

Alexa is making some new international friends.

Amazon said it’s starting to sell a handful of Echo devices in India on Wednesday by invitation only. The company said it also plans to bring the Echo to Japan later this year.

Amazon is bringing its Echo devices, which are powered by its Alexa voice assistant, to India as it works to expand in the second most-populous country in the world and is facing tough competition from Flipkart, Snapdeal and others. Getting Indian customers to buy Echo devices could help Amazon convert more of them to loyal Prime members. Amazon launched its membership service in India last year.

Japan, meanwhile, has been a valuable international market for Amazon for years, with Prime launching in the country 10 years ago.

In India, Amazon will sell the new Echo, Echo Plus and Echo Dot. The devices will start shipping in the country later this month. Echo devices have already been available for sale in the US, UK and Germany.

Alexa now speaks in American English, British English and English with an Indian accent, as well as German, depending on which market a customer is in.

Additionally, with Alexa’s increased ability to understand context and intent, the voice assistant will be able to understand sentences that include proper nouns in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malyalam, or Punjabi, such as names of places, songs and movie titles, an Amazon spokeswoman said Wednesday. 

The international expansion was announced a few days after Amazon unveiled a large slate of new Echo devices at an event in its Seattle headquarters. The announcement also comes a few hours before a Google hardware event that’s expected to show off rival Home smart speakers.