Amazon has acquired Graphiq Inc., a data visualisation and search engine startup, to improve its Alexa Virtual Assistant and other services.
According to reports, the deal is estimated to be valued at $50 million. Amazon and Graphiq declined to comment.
Graphiq, based in Santa Barbara, Calif., which was known as FindTheBest until it rebranded itself last August, offers tools to help people find and compare products in categories from electronic gadgets to homes. The data trove it has assembled in that time could come handy for Amazon, which is working hard to make Alexa, the software powering its popular Echo connected to home devices, smarter and more useful for customers.
In addition to improving Alexa, these companies want consumers to use their respective devices and the smart software powering them as their digital valets, useful for finding and ordering products, calling a ride service, playing music—all based on spoken commands.
The Amazon Echo/Alexa competing with the Google Home device, Apple’s HomePod and Microsoft’s invoke.
Last year, Graphiq produced a now-unavailable Alexa app geared toward answering questions such as “What is the fastest 2016 sedan?” Amazon also gave Graphiq access to a books-related database to put its technology to the test, according to a source.
The company had raised approximately $32 million in private financing, with Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Pritzker Group Venture Capital as its biggest venture capital backers. Montgomery & Co. and Silicon Valley Bank also provided funding.
Sources said Graphiq drew interest from Google and IBM before settling on an agreement with Amazon.
Graphiq’s chief executive officer Kevin O’Connor said a recent interview that “People were going to realize Graphiq’s technology is extraordinarily strategic. You can see it happening with the Amazon Echo, Siri, Google Now. Rather than making people think like computers, we’re making computers think like people.”
