Experiences designed around the human voice will fundamentally improve the way people use technology. Since introducing Amazon Echo, we’ve heard from developers, manufacturers, and start-ups of all sizes who want to innovate with voice. The Alexa Fund--named for Alexa, the cloud-based voice service that powers Amazon Echo--provides up to $100 million in investments to fuel voice technology innovation.

Amazon today announced two new recipients of the Alexa Fund, Musaic and Rachio. Musaic and Rachio are the latest additions to the growing portfolio of Alexa Fund recipients, and join the seven previously funded companies announced in June, including: Orange Chef, Scout Alarm, Garageio, Toymail, Dragon Innovation, MARA, and Mojio. 

The Alexa Skills Kit (ASK) is a collection of self-service APIs and tools that make it fast and easy for you to create new voice-driven capabilities for Alexa. Alexa is the cloud-based voice service that powers Amazon Echo, a new category of device designed around your voice.

We announced the availability of the Alexa Skills Kit a little over a month ago, and we’ve been impressed with some of the skills developers are teaching Alexa. We wanted to give you an early look at a few of these third-party Alexa skills that are starting to come out of the pipeline.

Join us on Monday August 10, 2015 at the Hilton Union Square in San Francisco for a full day of learning and activities. Our Developer Evangelists will share tips and best practices on how to build, optimize and monetize your apps and games. The developer day is complimentary and doesn't require Casual Connect event badge access.