Nuance Brings Voice to Liberty Global Cable TV Offering
Nuance Communications has signed a deal with Liberty Global Group, the largest international cable company, to integrate Nuance's Dragon TV voice technology into its Virgin Media TV Anywhere App.
Virgin Media subscribers in Ireland will now be able to search and access films and TV channels by simply clicking the microphone icon located in the app and speaking into their smartphones' microphones. The new service is available to all customers with a Virgin TV package and Android/iOS device.
Dragon TV leverages advances in deep learning and natural language understanding to create this conversational interface for subscribers. Dragon TV, already used in more than 60 million households, is part of Nuance's Smart Home portfolio. It leverages Nuance's advancements in deep learning and natural language understanding and supports both embedded and cloud-based voice technologies for integration within set top-boxes, remote controls, and second-screen mobile applications. Dragon TV can recognize and speak thousands of show titles, programs, movies, genres, and content and is fully customizable across more than 40 languages.
"We want our subscribers to have easy access to all of their favorite content, and it needs to be simple to find and use. With all the content we offer across sources like live TV, replay TV, and on-demand, we need to ensure our subscribers can easily discover their next favorite show or movie. By developing a voice interface in partnership with Nuance, we've created a new conversational interface that is intelligent and intuitive. We believe voice will grow to become an important means for our subscribers to interact with our entertainment products and services going forward, from apps to devices and smart home appliances," said Mark Giesbers, vice president of entertainment products at Liberty Global, in a statement.
"Voice transforms the traditional TV interface and is making content fully accessible, creating new opportunities for the subscriber and for the operator with new revenue and engagement potential," said Dan Faulkner, senior vice president and general manager for communications service providers at Nuance Mobile, in a statement. "Working closely with Liberty Global, we've integrated our AI-driven speech recognition as part of a remote control that delivers an amazing experience for their subscribers, fully optimized to find and deliver content across thousands of titles, names, and programs."