The virtual assistants of Salute are celebrating their first birthday today: exactly one year ago, Athena, Joy and Sber were born. Having made their debut at the SberConf-2020 conference, they quickly managed to conquer the gadgets and the hearts of their users. The clever trinity settled in the mobile applications of SberBank Online and Sber Salyut, as well as in Sber smart devices: the SberBox multimedia TV box and the SberPortal smart display. Over the past year, other devices have appeared: the SberBox Top TV media center and devices controlled by Salyut TV, and the line of such devices is constantly expanding.
Assistants grow by leaps and bounds, gaining experience, gaining new knowledge and constantly expanding the list of useful functions. For many, they have become not only assistants, but also friends, advisers and just pleasant interlocutors with whom it is funny to exchange a few words at their leisure. Imagine: over a year, more than 20 million people talked to Salut's assistants. We hope that today they all will not forget to congratulate their virtual friends. In the meantime, Athena, Joy and Sberbank make wishes and blow out the candles on the cake, we decided to take stock of the first year of their lives.
EXCELLENT, GICK AND VALLEY
Salute is the world's first family of virtual assistants with different characters. Each user can choose a character close in spirit, with whom he is most comfortable to communicate. Virtual assistants not only answer the user's questions, but also ask their preferences. They strive to get to know a person better, to make friends with him, in order to help even better in doing everyday affairs. And each in its own way.
Sber is the only representative of the stronger sex in this trinity. He is a bit introverted, reserved but outgoing. A typical geek, advanced and well versed in new technologies. When inventing Joy, its creators were guided by several perky and young characters of popular culture at once. The result is a collective image of a cheerful girl, a joker and a mischievous woman. Her very name (from the English “joy” – joy) speaks for itself. Joy is active and active, appeals to the user on “you”, easy to communicate, but extremely competent.
Athena is the complete opposite of Joy. If she went to school, she would surely be an excellent student. She is one of those girls who always succeeds: perfectionist, collected and organized. Athena is an ideal business partner, communicates exclusively on “you”, appreciates order and constantly strives to systematize information.
EXPERIENCE LIKE PEOPLE
Empathy and empathy are an important part of communication, and every day virtual assistants are becoming more emotional. Over the past year, their characters have evolved, and today virtual assistants can easily discuss many things. For example, not just tell about the weather, but also emotionally express your opinion: in the rain, advise you to stay at home, and on a sunny day – go for a walk.
During this year, assistants, together with people, experienced many special dates and events. On the eve of May 9, they told the story of the first victorious fireworks display in 1943 in the format of an interactive audio performance. And for the New Year, they gave gifts to users.
From the outside it may seem that the assistants are limited in movement, but this is not so: all year they led an extremely intense social life. Athena, for example, attended the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, she chaired a session on artificial intelligence. In addition, she even asked her question to the President of Russia at the AI Journey 2020 conference. Joy tried herself as a TV host of a show on SberPrime TV.
EXPLAIN ON FINGERS
Salute is not only the name of the family, but also a code word that calls the virtual assistant (“Salute, tell me about the weather” or “Salute, I want ice cream”). Depending on the device, assistants can be accessed by voice, touch or remote control, and on devices with a camera, they also respond to gestures. They have responded to over 1.2 million gestures this year. The most popular movement was the thumbs up: most often the assistants were asked to “like” the song they liked.
It is not only Sberbank's team that is responsible for teaching assistants new skills – external developers can also do this. During the year, through their joint efforts, about 800 smartups appeared – applications for the Salyut family. On the eve of the birthday of Athena, Joy and Sber, they presented a very special smartup. It helps users learn interesting facts about assistants. To launch it, you need to say: “Fireworks, happy birthday!”
“SALUTE, TRANSFER ME TO A MILLION CARD”
Salyut virtual assistants help users of not only smart devices, but also SberBank Online applications. They masterfully possess economic information and help save time on financial transactions. It is worth saying: “Transfer 3 thousand to my English teacher” – and on average, after 17 seconds, the money is already falling into the account. And the most nimble users manage to do the same operation in three seconds! During the year, Sberbank's clients transferred about 9 billion rubles with the help of assistants.
Assistants help users in other matters as well: they know how to buy and sell currency, analyze income and expenses. And in June the assistants set another record by answering 100,000 questions about the stock market and brokerage services of SberBank.
NOW I WILL SINGLE!
Salute's assistants know how not only to work effectively, but also to have great fun. Cinema and music are their strong points. Athena, Joy and Sber are very fond of music, and this year they got used to recognizing songs that sound nearby. And, of course, they will gladly include any hit. In 2021, most often they were asked to include Khabib's song “Yagoda-Malinka”.
By the way, on the eve of the birthday of virtual assistants, special playlists appeared on the SberSvuk service for each assistant: Sberbank, Athens and Joy.
300 KILO POPCORN
“If Joy were a real girl, I would marry her – she is so economic,” some users admit. All jokes, but virtual assistants are great helpers in everyday life. Especially if you need to order groceries and any other goods at home. A year ago, they knew how to organize the delivery of only 16 products, including popcorn (during this time, users bought more than 300 kilograms of popcorn!). Today Athena, Joy and Sberbank can order more than 815 thousand goods in 150 cities of Russia. Bread and milk remain the most popular products: they are sure to be found in 17% of orders.
Salute's assistants will help you book a table in a restaurant, order cleaning at a cleaning company or organize a trip to a hairdresser. Virtual assistants have even found their way into public services. This year, they made friends with the robot Max and thanks to him help users get advice on the most popular government services. By the way, the most popular request this year was the page with the vaccination certificate, the transferred coronavirus or the PCR test done.
“CAN CATS LOVE?”
Athena, Joy and Sber are curious as children – and constantly strive to learn new things. Over the year, their knowledge base has expanded significantly. Every day, assistants give answers to 10 thousand questions from various fields of science, culture, music, geography, history, chemistry, literature. Often, users are interested in completely unexpected things. For example, they asked: “Why do people often do not pay attention to the fact that someone is not indifferent to them?” Or they consulted: “How to persuade a loved one to throw me a lot of money on the card?” Well, the most popular question of the year turned out to be: “Why is the sun so hot?”
ONLY NUMBERS
– During the year, virtual assistants Salute showed users more than 67 thousand news stories.
– The most popular film on demand among viewers was the picture “Palma”. The story of director Alexander Domogarov Jr. about the Soviet Hachiko was asked to include 22.3 thousand people.
– The audience watched the animated series “Masha and the Bear” for the longest time – a total of 2784 days.
