In another sign that Amazon is changing course with Alexa, the company has warned developers that it will soon stop paying them to build Alexa skills.
As spotted by Bloomberg, Amazon posted a notice on its Alexa development site noting that it would soon end its seven-year-old program that awarded Amazon Web Services credits to developers who built and published Alexa skills.
Amazon will cease issuing AWS credits for Alexa skills after June 30, the notice says.
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Bloomberg also reports that Amazon will end monthly cash payments to the developers of popular Alexa skills, although Alexa developers will still be allowed to collect revenue from in-app purchases.
In a statement to TechHive, an Amazon spokesperson said the company chose to “sunset” the rewards programs because they had “run their course.”
“These are older programs launched back in 2017 as a way to help newer developers interested in building skills accelerate their progress,” the rep said. “Today, there are over 160,000 skills available for customers, a well-established Alexa developer community, and new LLM-powered tools that will help developers build new experiences for Alexa.”
Less than 1 percent of Alexa developers were still using the two rewards programs, according to the Bloomberg report.
Amazon has originally viewed Alexa skills as a major revenue driver for its then-nascent voice assistant. But while some early developers of Alexa skills reaped thousands of dollars a month for their Alexa skills, many more found the effort wasn’t worth the meager return.
Amazon wasn’t making much money from Alexa skills either, Bloomberg reports, and thus began shrinking the size of its cash payments to Alexa developers starting in 2020.
Amazon’s move follows the unveiling last fall of a revamped version of Alexa that’s powered by Amazon’s new large language model.
The new Alexa is capable of such feats as conducting smooth, open-ended conversations, writing stories and invitations, responding to a user’s emotions, and obeying natural-language commands for controlling smart home devices.
Amazon execs have said the company is considering charging for this new “superhuman” version of Alexa, while the original Alexa would remain free.
That said, there is reportedly dissent within Amazon about the feasibility of charging extra for a so-called “Alexa Plus,” with the AI-enhanced Alexa said to be “falling short of expectations.”
Updated shortly after publication with a statement from Amazon.
Author: Ben Patterson, Senior Writer
Ben has been writing about technology and consumer electronics for more than 20 years. A PCWorld contributor since 2014, Ben joined TechHive in 2019, where he covers smart speakers, soundbars, and other smart and home-theater devices. You can follow Ben on Twitter.