VoiceXML Forum Adds New Leadership

PISCATAWAY, NJ - The VoiceXML Forum announced that it has expanded its Board of Directors and elected new officers. Representatives from Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ), Nuance (Nasdaq: NUAN), VoiceGenie Technologies Inc. and West Corporation (Nasdaq: WSTC) will join AT&T (NYSE: T), IBM (NYSE: IBM), Lucent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: LU) and Motorola Inc. (NYSE:MOT) as sponsors and will join the Board of Directors to provide overall strategic direction and leadership. Igor Jablokov of IBM succeeds Bill Dykas as chairman of the VoiceXML Forum. The VoiceXML Forum is a four-year old industry organization chartered with establishing and promoting Voice Extensible Markup Language (VoiceXML), a technology standard essential to making Internet content and information accessible via voice and phone. With the backing and technology contributions of its diverse membership, the VoiceXML Forum is uniquely positioned to help drive the evolution of VoiceXML and accelerate market adoption for speech-enabled applications worldwide. "We are pleased to welcome our new Sponsor members," said Jablokov. "Hewlett-Packard, Nuance, VoiceGenie and West have been key contributors in the Forum since its inception, and VoiceXML is critical to their companies' speech strategies. The decision to invite these companies to become sponsors and their interest in assuming a leadership role, demonstrates the tremendous industry interest in the Forum and the importance of VoiceXML to the industry." Members of the VoiceXML Board of Directors include:

• Chairman: Igor Jablokov, IBM


• Vice Chairman: Mark Disbrow, Lucent Technologies Inc.


• Treasurer: Eileen Natale, AT&T


• Secretary: Cindy Tiritilli, IEEE-ISTO


• Director: Mark Randolph, Motorola Inc.


• Director: Bruce Pollock, West Corporation


• Director: Dan Burnett, Nuance


• Director: Eric Jackson, VoiceGenie Technologies Inc.


• Director: Scott McGlashan, Hewlett-Packard

"Our research indicates that revenues from the development of voice applications will exceed $1.5 billion for hardware, software and professional services in 2007," said Dan Miller, senior analyst at Zelos Group, and author of the recently published Roadmap Report on the Voice Application Infrastructure. "Much of this growth will be fueled by the use of IP-based platforms to extend Web-based self-service applications over the telephone. The VoiceXML Forum has played an important role in defining the standard. New Sponsors and an expanding leadership will aid the Forum in driving deployment of VoiceXML as the standard for building voice applications on open platforms rather than proprietary IVR systems."