Big Technology Podcast Amazon's Panos Panay: The Reality of Building Alexa Plus and AI Assistants
92 snips
Oct 22, 2025 
Panos Panay, Head of Devices & Services at Amazon, shares insights on the Alexa Plus rollout and the complexities of building AI assistants. He reveals that over 10 million users are in early access and discusses the importance of balancing innovation with user trust. Panos highlights impressive engagement metrics and explores how ambient AI will transform user interactions with devices. He touches on the future of wearables and the significance of purposeful design in new products, as well as Amazon's recycling initiatives for old devices.
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Methodical Rollout Protects Existing Users
- Amazon is rolling Alexa Plus out as opt-in early access and plans broad availability by end of October.
- Panos frames the gradual rollout as learning from varied home environments to protect existing user experience.
Protect Trust While Moving Fast
- Prioritize customer trust when introducing AI changes and avoid surprising users by forcing new modes on them.
- Move fast like day one but keep existing customers' workflows intact to prevent losing trust.
Photo To Calendar: A Real Use Case
- Panos described sharing a photo of his daughter's sports schedule with Alexa which auto-created calendar events and suggested conflict resolutions.
- He used the story to show agentic orchestration of experts, APIs, and contextual actions working end-to-end.
