Google`s Home Hub smart display spotlights another Microsoft failure
(Windows Phone Central)

Google`s Home Hub joins Amazon`s Echo Show in an ambient-computing, smart-display space in which Microsoft is conspicuously absent. Amazon pioneered the progression of voice-controlled ambient computing with its Alexa-powered smart speakers. The Google Assistant-powered Google Home and Apple`s Siri-powered HomePod eventually followed. In 2017, Amazon upped the ante with its Amazon Echo Show smart display. The Echo Show brought the ability to display interactive content to the smart speaker battle. Microsoft was notably absent from this space until the embarrassingly-neglected Cortana-powered Invoke Harman Kardon smart speaker hit store shelves. With little marketing and an assistant with limited skills, mindshare and geographic reach, Microsoft`s initially-$200-priced speakers remained unnoticed by consumers. A recent Invoke price cut and Microsoft`s repositioning of Cortana as a business-focused assistive agent may signal Microsoft has little intention of recommitting to the c...