Growing up, I was intensely jealous of the crew of Star Trek’s USS Enterprise.

Not only did those plucky explorers in their snappy uniforms get to spend their lives cruising around the galaxy battling alien foes and discovering exciting new worlds, but their technology was miles ahead of anything I could hope to get my teenage hands on.

Struggling at the time with dial-up internet and a mobile phone the size of a house brick, the show opened my eyes to the possibilities of what technology could be in the future – touch-screen computers, sentient AI, lasers, and holograms.

And how incredible it would be, I thought, to have a computer that you could talk to – one that could answer questions just like the ship’s computer did.

Well, it seems a few other people had the same idea.

Branching out from the early (and, frankly, not very successful) attempts at voice recognition used in mobile phones, there is now a range of devices available for you to buy that finally make talking to your computer a reality.

Aside from ‘intelligent personal assistants’ like Apple’s Siri and Microsoft’s Cortana built into our phones and computers already, you can now purchase stand-alone ‘smart speakers’ for your home. Without needing to push a single button, these devices spring to life, once they hear their name said out loud, are capable of searching the internet for you, running apps, reading you the news headlines, and even controlling other smart aspects of your home.

Here, we’ll take a look at the current smart speaker options on the market and find out what’s to come in the years ahead.

https://www.chipin.com/smart-speakers-future/

FPI core product's market size grow more than 24% CAGR by 2021 (Technavio)

4 Reasons to invest in FPI (Insider Asia)

《資匯》獨家專訪FPI 《2大因素前景看好 台灣聯友今年再尋突破》

Growth + Net Cash + Dividend = the DNA of FPI (Harry)