Google’s New Gadgets Come With a Big Helping of A.I.<br />SAN FRANCISCO — Google’s unveiling of new smartphones, smart speakers<br />and other gadgets had all the makings of a typical technology product launch: a fawning crowd of superfans, skeptical journalists, slick product videos, not-so-subtle jabs at the competition, and overly romanticized descriptions of design choices, colors and materials.<br />Google executives said it has been getting harder to find new hardware breakthroughs like bigger and better screens, but they believe significant improvements will come from artificial intelligence software<br />that is developing at a faster clip than physical components.<br />It introduced two new Pixel smartphones, Google Home speakers both small<br />and large, a laptop running the company’s Chrome software, a new virtual reality headset and wireless headphones.<br />Unlike the way an Apple event is conducted — usually chock-full of talk about chip speeds<br />and screen resolutions — Google didn’t spend much time on product specifications.<br />Rick Osterloh, Google’s senior vice president of hardware, compared the company’s strategy for building devices to search and email.<br />The question of Google’s commitment to hardware is a testament to the challenges of competing against devices made by Apple, Amazon and Samsung.<br />Sundar Pichai, Google’s chief executive, spent the first 10 minutes explaining<br />how artificial intelligence was helping Google Maps and its translations.<br />first” company, this is a “unique moment in time” for Google to combine hardware, software and artificial intelligence.
