Speech Technology Magazine

Talview, a talent assessment technology platform, announced its collaboration with Microsoft to further artificial intelligence and machine learning in recruitment, with the launch of Qton, a talent assistant chatbot.

Dashbot, a conversational analytics platform, entered into a strategic partnership with Recime, an enterprise chatbot building platform.

Orderscape.com, an order automation and voice technology software company, announced a full-menu ordering certification by Amazon for Fazoli's restaurants. Fazoli's customers can now order meals via natural language processing as an Alexa skill at some locations.

SoundHound Inc., a provider of voice-enabled AI and conversational intelligence technologies, expanded the multi-language text-to-speech (TTS) offerings for its Houndify voice AI platform through a partnership with Acapela Group, a provider of voice and speech solutions.

According to Gartner, 25% of customer service and support operations will integrate virtual customer assistant (VCA) or chatbot technology across engagement channels by 2020 -- up from less than 2% in 2017. More than half of organizations have already invested in VCAs for customer service as they realize the advantages of automated self-service.

[24]7.ai, a provider of intent-driven customer experience solutions, announced its Winter 2018 Release, which enhances the company's flagship product [24]7 AIVA, to support both informational and conversational journeys in a single solution.

Winscribe announced the launch of Winscribe Text version 8.5.

CallVU, a provider of innovative Omni-Channel solutions that enable organizations to engage customers in their channels of choice, announced the newest addition to its Digital Engagement Platform, Conversational IVR.

Speechmatics announced the launch of Global English, a single English language pack supporting all major English accents for use in speech-to-text transcription.

PromptSmart, a teleprompter app announced the launch of its PromptSmart Pro app for Android. All of the features users love about PromptSmart Pro are included, plus a new look and feel.

Want to be at the heart of the speech recognition revolution? You might have to move to China—specifically Hefei, Anhui province. Plans have been announced to build a hub for companies working on speech recognition technologies.

Nuance Communications, Inc. announced that it has advanced its text-to-speech (TTS) technology with deep neural networks (DNN) to deliver a new standard of quality, reducing errors by 40% compared to previous speech synthesis techniques.

According to The Information, Amazon may be looking to make Alexa even smarter with the help of an AI chip. What's more is that the company is reportedly designing the chip itself, with an aim toward improving Alexa's ability to answer your questions quickly.

GreenKey Technologies, creator of patented voice software with integrated speech recognition designed for the financial markets, announced that the firm will release its voice API through OpenFin's plugin architecture. OpenFin is the secure desktop operating system used by 45 of the world's banks. The move brings the voice software to potentially thousands of new users at hundreds of firms and creates the first industry standard for adding voice to a firm's applications.

Carnegie Mellon University researchers say they "have created a conversational agent that is tough to stump." How? By adding humans into the mix. The chatbot system is called Evorus.

Visionstate Corp. announced that it has received final TSX Venture Exchange approval for the expedited acquisition of Montreal-based Chatbot Incubator. Pursuant to the terms of the Transaction, Visionstate has purchased 30% of the shares held by Chatbot shareholders in exchange for 4,000,000 common shares of Visionstate at a deemed price of $0.065 per common share, for the consideration of $260,000. 

HP says it's Skill Printer will print anything from forms to coloring pages with a simple, "Alexa, ask my printer to…" command.

eGain, a provider of cloud-based customer engagement solutions, announced that chatbot silos are the biggest hurdle for consumers in using virtual assistants. The finding is from an independent survey of 3,000 consumers, conducted by Chatbots.org.

Voice recognition technology allows the Breaking Sound Barriers app uses voice recognition technology to subtitle teachers and lecturers in real time.

WP Engine, a WordPress digital experience platform, announced its collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to launch the Amazon Polly plugin, which transforms text into lifelike speech. With the assistance of the Amazon Polly plugin, publishers can turn their written content into podcasts to reach consumers on the go.

Envision, a contact center workforce optimization provider, announced that it has entered into a partnership agreement with Applied Voice & Speech Technologies, Inc. (AVST), provider in the field of enterprise communications solutions.

Bright Pattern has extended its cloud contact center service to Singapore.

Essence's WeR@Home allows users to connect smart home systems with voice commands through Google Assistant.

AI-driven feature proactively recommends additional, customized keywords to help marketers better understand why customers are picking up the phones. (Featured on SmartCustomerService.com.)

Sensory's TrulyHandsfree always-listening voice control allows Avaya Vantage phone users to make calls, video conference, and check voicemail by voice.

Voice-controlled solution integrates with digital assistants to provide last-mile guidance.

Provana is offering Eureka speech analytics as part of its Integrated Call Analytics Platform (ICAP). (Featured on SmartCustomerService.com.)

Offering relies on human transcribers to clean up machine-generated transcripts for greater accuracy.

NoteSwift's Samantha virtual assistant helps doctors dictate into their athenahealth electronic health records.