Cortana’s Expansion of the Boundaries of Search

Those who are closely connected to innovations in the digital world are aware that Google has been talking for years about building a conversational machine that understands and naturally communicates answers to spoken questions. Although the company has certainly been making progress toward that objective, Microsoft may have jumped into the lead in this realm with its launch of Cortana on the PC.

At the recent Windows 10 event, Microsoft’s new holographic goggles, HoloLens, and its digital assistant Cortana were met with a great deal of interest from the industry.

Search Engine Land has reported that Bing provides the “intelligence engine” or “intelligence fabric” at the center of Cortana. Cortana can be described as a stack of technology and capabilities, which include speech recognition, natural language understanding and an index of information (Bing) among others.

Cortana can be seen as a new entry point for Bing as well. However, Cortana, Google Now and Siri all reflect the emergence of a broader usage paradigm, which transcends traditional speech. The first suggestion of this came with the appearance of Siri before Apple acquired the technology. Google Now has pushed this concept further with “predictive search.”

Although Cortana may be seen by some as a response to Siri or Google Now, Microsoft explains that in actuality, the technology has been evolving within the company for years, primarily in the area of speech recognition and natural language comprehension.

Google possesses some of the same deep technology assets as Microsoft, however, Apple does not. Siri is thin in comparison and relies on third parties for speech recognition, thereby illustrating the risk of Apple falling behind Google and Microsoft as the digital assistant competition increases in the coming period. Perhaps Apple will counter this with strategic investments or acquisitions, although this is only speculative at this point.

Search Engine Land spoke with Microsoft search engineers Ryan Gavin and Mike Calcagno, after the recent Windows 10 announcement, about the future of the Bing brand and how it relates to the rise of Cortana. The Microsoft search engineers suggested that Bing and Cortana will coexist, as opposed to Cortana’s evolution eventually making Bing obsolete.

“We’re opening up a new class of experiences,” said Microsoft’s Calcagno, who compared the Bing-Cortana relationship to the way that the mobile web and apps currently coexist. “We’re transforming not only what you can search but how you search.”

Microsoft clearly has lofty plans for Cortana, seeing its “always on” capability as a way to liberate search from a traditional query box. “We’re giving people access to the power of search without disrupting what people are doing,” they explained.

However, the two Microsoft search engineers don’t see Cortana taking over search anytime soon. They explained that Bing is expanding and being more deeply integrated across Windows and in other Microsoft products, including Word.

Gavin further explained that, with Cortana, “We’re making a long-term bet on richer interactivity and more natural interactions. We’re creating new user paradigms and bringing search into the context of what you’re already doing.”

The concept of integrating search with an increased level of intelligence into natural interactions is truly an exciting prospect, and if Microsoft succeeds with its plans before others, the future of search could lie in Cortana.