Amazon.com (AMZN) stock is trading higher Wednesday on news the company is in the process of launching an upgraded version of its Alexa voice assistant. And media reports indicate the e-commerce giant plans to offer Alexa as a monthly paid subscription separate from Amazon Prime.
Amazon will upgrade Alexa with generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) and plans to charge a monthly subscription fee separate from Amazon Prime to offset the cost. This is according to CNBC, which cites sources familiar with the plans. The launch is expected to come later this year but a price has not yet been determined, the report added.
The news comes as the AI race heats up. Just a week ago, for instance, OpenAI announced GPT-4o, which is a faster and smarter AI assistant that includes features such as real-time translation, tutoring and interview preparation.
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Alexa was first launched by Amazon in November 2014, but has not received a major upgrade in the near decade since. However, in his 2023 shareholder letter, Amazon.com CEO Andy Jassy said that the company was "building a substantial number of GenAI applications across every Amazon consumer business," including "an even more intelligent and capable Alexa."
Amazon also spoke of its plans to upgrade Alexa in a September 2023 blog post.
"We've always thought of Alexa as an evolving service, and we've been continuously improving it since the day we introduced it in 2014," Amazon said. "A longstanding mission has been to make a conversation with Alexa as natural as talking to another human, and with the rapid development of generative AI, what we imagined is now well within reach."
However, the blog post made no mention of plans to charge a monthly subscription for the upgraded version of Alexa, though doing so could certainly help boost the company's top line.
Is Amazon stock a buy, sell or hold?
Analysts overwhelmingly think Amazon is one of the best stocks to buy and it's also one of the top-rated Dow Jones stocks to boot. This is unsurprising given the jaw-dropping return AMZN has generated for long-term investors.
Part of the stock's strength is a result of the company's ability to capture growth, particularly in difficult macro environments.
"Amazon's retail sales were up 10% in the most recent quarter where the consumer still traded down on price," says Shams Afzal, managing director and portfolio manager for Carnegie Investment Counsel. "Efficiency through serving eight different regions rather than one large national network is paying dividends, turning its entire retail division profitable."
Amazon's cloud division, which is responsible for more than 80% of the company's operating income, is another catalyst for this impressive financial performance, Afzal adds.
According to S&P Global Market Intelligence, the consensus analyst target price for AMZN stock is $217.97, representing implied upside of about 20% to current levels. Meanwhile, the consensus recommendation is a Strong Buy.
"Given the company's indisputable franchise leadership, ability to leverage its vendor relationships in the retail space, and market dominance and superior growth in infrastructure-as-a-service, we believe that AMZN warrants long-term accumulation in most equity accounts," Argus Research analyst Jim Kelleher said in May research report. "We recommend initiating new positions or dollar-averaging into existing positions on share price weakness."
Argus currently rates Amazon a Buy with a $205 price target, representing implied upside of about 11% to current levels.
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