Madrid, February 1, 2019: ZOE, the first virtual personal cruise assistant on board a cruise ship, is ready to take MSC Cruises' passenger services to a new level, thanks to technology that will make the onboard experience much more complete. ZOE is an artificial intelligence device developed in collaboration with HARMAN and Samsung Electronics. This innovative device, available in all cabins, is voice-activated and speaks seven languages.
Among ZOE's features are answering hundreds of questions about the cruise, guiding passengers onboard, providing information about ship services, making suggestions, and helping with booking services. It's very easy to use: passengers simply say "OK ZOE" and it will activate. Its advanced voice recognition makes it easy to use and access information simply by using voice commands.
ZOE is a unique tool in the cruise industry and yet another example of how MSC Cruises continues to pioneer the use of technology to enhance the passenger experience. ZOE will be available on board MSC Bellissima and will now be incorporated into new ships in the fleet, such as MSC Grandiosa – which will be launched in November – and MSC Virtuosa, which will enter service in 2020.
Gianni Onorato, CEO of MSC Cruises, commented: “The cruise experience is constantly evolving, becoming richer and offering an ever-expanding range of products and services. In 2017, we launched MSC for Me, an innovative digital platform that quickly became a benchmark in the industry and revolutionized how passengers can personalize their holidays. Technology became an integral part of the design of our new ships, applied at every stage of the development process for each prototype, from design to construction.”
Gianni Onorato added: “This was just the starting point for offering a more connected onboard experience. We identified a basic need: to provide quick and easy answers to passengers’ common questions, so they can make the most of their vacation. We looked at the latest connected technologies and saw that voice assistants and artificial intelligence offered the best way to meet this need. That’s how we started working on ZOE.”
COLLABORATING TO INNOVATE
This innovative artificial intelligence service was developed in collaboration with MSC Cruises' business innovation team and HARMAN International, a subsidiary of Samsung Electronics. The collaboration combines cutting-edge voice activation technology with MSC Cruises' industry expertise. Their shared goal is to integrate connected technologies into everyday life on board a cruise ship.
“Today, users increasingly demand connected experiences, regardless of where they live, work, or, from now on, where they travel,” says Sanjay Dhawan, CTO and President of HARMAN Connected Services. “Virtual assistants and voice recognition services are transforming the user experience, providing a more personalized, adaptable, and intuitive service. Our team at HARMAN Connected Services is delighted to bring this innovation to the MSC Cruises fleet, as we modernize and enhance the end-to-end passenger experience.”.
ZOE's design features cutting-edge technology, including integrated audio solutions with far-field microphones and a professional-grade speaker to deliver the ultimate sound experience. Passengers can also connect their phones to the device via Bluetooth and listen to music in their cabin. Incorporating a state-of-the-art quad-core processor for superior response times, ZOE's design paves the way for the future and will continue to evolve, offering passengers increasingly sophisticated experiences. Looking ahead, ZOE will offer greater personalization and become a multi-channel personal assistant, taking on new forms within the MSC for Me space.
ZOE is designed to enrich the MSC for Me ecosystem and interacts with the cabin television. It collaborates on the project with Samsung Electronics, an MSC Cruises partner, which designed the hotel management system software that allows the personal assistant to connect with the television and offer passengers more information and other services tailored to them.
Hyesung Ha, Senior Vice President of the Enterprise Product Marketing Group at Samsung Electronics, commented, “Samsung has always been committed to strengthening its technological leadership to deliver technology that improves people’s lives and brings innovation to everyone. The agreement with MSC Cruises is an example of how our innovative solutions enhance the passenger experience: not only with devices that provide access to onboard information and entertainment content, but also by offering a complete and authentic digital experience. Through this long-term collaboration, Samsung and MSC Cruises are bringing genuine innovation to the cruise industry.”
GET ANSWERS FROM THE COMFORT OF YOUR CABIN
To ensure ZOE responds effectively to all passengers, the tool is programmed and prepared to answer more than 800 of the most frequently asked questions on board, each with thousands of variations. Tests were conducted on the conversation design, ZOE's natural speech recognition and its ability to convert speech to text and vice versa, as well as numerous other tests related to behavior, user experience, and functionality. Therefore, as an artificial intelligence solution, ZOE is designed to continuously learn and refine its responses based on its real-world interactions with passengers.
ZOE operates 24/7 as a virtual personal assistant on board. It is not designed to replace human interaction between crew and passengers, but rather to offer passengers the ability to communicate and find information conveniently, without leaving their cabin.
You can find more information about ZOE at https://www.msccruceros.es/es-es/Descubre-MSC/Zoe.aspx and about MSC Bellissima at https://www.msccruceros.es/es-es/Barcos-De-Crucero/MSC-Bellissima.aspx
