Amazon's next Alexa AI upgrade may be able to handle more complex tasks. Getting there is expensive, though.
Internal planning documents reviewed by Business Insider show Amazon is working on a previously unreported Alexa project, codenamed Moonraker, to handle more complex, multistep tasks for users.
Moonraker pushes Alexa into the AI agent race. Alexa+, its AI-powered assistant, already lets users book rides or buy tickets through partners such as Uber and Ticketmaster. Moonraker would take that a step further by completing multiple actions from a single request.
The project also highlights the steep cost of building more capable AI. Internal documents show Moonraker quickly became one of the most expensive parts of Amazon's latest Alexa+ overhaul.
Amazon has been working through several Alexa+ growing pains. The company delayed the assistant's rollout multiple times before expanding availability in the US earlier this year. Business Insider previously reported that internal beta testing uncovered problems, such as hallucinations and inconsistent responses, with one employee saying Alexa mistakenly turned off a fish tank filter, killing their fish.
Despite these challenges, Amazon remains committed to expanding Alexa+. In his latest annual shareholder letter, CEO Andy Jassy said customers are talking to Alexa+ twice as much and placing online orders three times more often than before, adding that "Alexa is still early in its journey to be the world's best personal assistant." Amazon declined to comment.
Multiple requests
The documents describe Moonraker as enabling "multi-request" engagements, offering examples such as "book me a ride and text my friend."
Rather than responding to a single command, the upgrade is designed to help Alexa complete several related actions within one interaction.
It's a move that mirrors other companies, such as OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic, that have introduced agentic AI products that can browse the web and complete multistep workflows.
"Highest cost" new initiative
Moonraker's ambitions, however, come with a hefty price tag.
One planning document from earlier this year called it Alexa+'s "highest cost" new initiative, projecting more than $100 million in GPU costs in 2026. The document suggested delaying or scaling back the project as one way to ease cost pressures.
Some Amazon leaders feel the team has overspent on the AI models powering Alexa, and the cost of running those models has become a growing internal concern, according to a person familiar with the matter. The pressure reflects a broader reckoning across Silicon Valley as companies grapple with the rising cost of deploying advanced AI systems.
Separate planning documents from late last year show Amazon preparing hundreds of Nvidia GPUs to support Moonraker and using an Anthropic Sonnet model for advanced reasoning and visual response functions as engineers tested the system ahead of a wider rollout.
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Eugene is Business Insider’s Chief Tech Correspondent, where he leads coverage of Amazon. His reporting spans the company’s retail operations, AWS, Alexa, and its secretive internal work culture.Previously, he worked at CNBC, Fortune Magazine Korea, and Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun. He holds degrees from NYU and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.In 2022, Eugene broke a story uncovering Amazon’s practice of deceptively enrolling customers in Prime and deliberately making cancellation difficult. A year later, the Federal Trade Commission sued the company, citing his reporting. That case culminated in a record $2.5 billion settlement in 2025.His reporting has earned multiple honors, including the SF Press Club’s Bay Area Journalism Award and SPJ NorCal’s Excellence in Journalism Award.Eugene lives in the Bay Area. Contact him via email at [email protected], or Signal, Telegram, or WhatsApp at 650-942-3061. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely. ExpertiseAmazon, Jeff Bezos, Andy Jassy, e-commerce, and cloud computing.Popular ArticlesAmazon:Internal Amazon emails give an exclusive look at how CEO Andy Jassy has started to run the company, with obsessive attention to the retail business and what some employees feel is micromanagingAndy Jassy will be the next CEO of Amazon. Insiders dish on what it's like to work for Jeff Bezos' successor, who built AWS into a $40 billion business.Internal documents show Amazon has for years knowingly tricked people into signing up for Prime subscriptions. 'We have been deliberately confusing,' former employee says.Inside Amazon's flailing brick-and-mortar ambitions: missed projections, pressure to cut costs, and a war with Whole FoodsInside Amazon's complex employee-review system, where workers feel left in the dark and managers expect to give 5% of reports bad reviewsAfter 28 years, 'Day 2' finally arrives at AmazonAWS, Alexa, healthcare:Inside Amazon's struggle to break into the lucrative market for SaaS business applications, including an internal pitch to buy $38 billion HubSpotInside Amazon's struggle to crack Nvidia's AI-chip dominanceAmazon's AI data center dream runs into the reality of 'zombie' facilities, higher costs, and labor shortagesAmazon is gutting its voice assistant, Alexa. Employees describe a division in crisis and huge losses on 'a wasted opportunity.'Amazon is working on a new 'Remarkable Alexa,' but internal politics and technical issues plague the projectAmazon projected huge losses from its healthcare business in 2024, but strong sales growth, internal document reveals
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