Apple's Echo competitor with Siri could be launched at WWDC 2017

Apple, reportedly, is working on a Siri-based smart home device with a speaker that could be launched as early as this WWDC.

That’s according to Sonny Dickson, who claims that Apple is currently in the process of finalising the speaker’s design. This speaker would be matched against other smart speakers like Amazon Echo and Google Home, putting Siri front and centre. Unsurprisingly, Apple will look to Beats to supply the speaker’s audio hardware, and Dickson also says it could utilise some variant of iOS.

It is believed to carry some form of Beats technology, and is expected to run an variant iOS

— Sonny Dickson (@SonnyDickson) April 27, 2017

Dickson also says that the speaker will sport a concave top with controls, and a mesh speaker covering the entire device. He shared with Mashable that it will take design cues from the Mac Pro, and the UE BOOM’s mesh styling.

In September 2016, Bloomberg reported that Apple's smart home device had entered prototype testing, including both a larger and a smaller model in line with Amazon's current Echo lineup. However, at the time, the report cautioned that Apple's early efforts do not guarantee that a finalised product will be released.