Amazon’s fall hardware events can usually be counted on for a couple of things: an avalanche of new devices, and at least one new product that’s genuinely nuts. Take the Amazon Astro, a two-wheeled Alexa-powered robot that was rolled out—literally—during Amazon’s fall 2021 hardware event. Amazon showed off plenty of pratical upgrades at its fall hardware event, but nothing genuinely nuts. Well, it turns out I was only half-right about Amazon’s fall hardware event this year. Well, one answer could be that Amazon’s become much more practical about its devices in the past couple of years, with a renewed focus on profitability as Panay took the reins from longtime Amazon hardware chief David Limb in fall 2023—which was, incidentally, the year Amazon uncharacteristically skipped its regular hardware event.