How Amazon blew Alexa’s shot to dominate AI, according to more than a dozen employees who worked on it

Limp demonstrates a new feature where users can ask language assistant Alexa why she did something when they can’t understand the actions of the software. — dpa/Getty Images/The New York Times

“Alexa, let’s chat.”

With that phrase, David Limp, at the time Amazon’s head of devices and services, showed off a new generative AI-powered version of the company’s signature Alexa voice assistant in September 2023.