Microsoft’s digital voice assistant Cortana will be rolled out in beta form to the UK and China along with its Windows 8.1 update, while the alpha version will be available users in Canada, India, and Australia.
In the UK Cortana will have a British accent and the personality of the app has been customised to be locally relevant.
Cortana has been designed to support UK spelling and pronunciation and Microsoft’s search engine Bing will provide local information on London Stock exchange, sports, and commuter conditions.
In China, the app will be named Xio Na, and Microsoft China has developed additional features to support Mandarin language for text, voice and speech recognition, along with specially tuned suggestions for the users in the country.
The software giant has also launched Alpha programme in Canada, Australia where through the early adopter programme, the company will allow people to use Cortana in UK or US English language models.
Microsoft is also planning to add new hardware capability for the next generation of devices powered by Windows 8.1, with dual-SIM phones along with smart covers.
