The SPEECH Community reports the latest news about companies and people in the voice business:

01 January 2010 – Healthcare POW

In early November, I was onsite at HCA MountainStar Health in Utah to role out their new backend speech recognition software for HIM dictation and pathology. The implementation was a big project that brought eight hospitals and 25 clinics live onto the eScription platform for computer aided medical transcription by Nuance.

01 January 2010 – Speech Community

Speech technologies provider, Loquendo, has announced that the three-year LUNA project - a European Union sponsored initiative - has concluded successfully. According to officials with Loquendo, the LUNA project addressed the problem of understanding spontaneous speech in the context of automated telephone systems. The main aim of the project was to develop a technology capable of understanding customer’s spoken requests, enabling the implementation of advanced vocal services as well as allowing callers to interact in a natural and intuitive way via spoken language understanding or “SLU.”

08 December 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Australian telephone carrier Optus has launched Voice to Text service, which uses SpinVox's voice-to-text conversion to deliver voicemail messages as text to a user's mobile phone. Instead of customers having to listen to their VoiceMail message to capture important information, a text message of the VoiceMail will automatically be sent to a customer’s mobile phone. Once read, the message can be replied to, forwarded and saved. The caller’s number is presented as the sender of the text to make it simple for customers to reply with a voice call or text.

06 December 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a leading provider of speech solutions, today announced its Voicemail to Text platform is powering the recently launched AT&T Voicemail to Text service. The service converts English and Spanish language wireless voicemail messages to text and delivers them via SMS, email or both, providing convenience and flexibility in how subscribers access, file and reply to mobile voicemail.

06 December 2009 – PR Newswire

MedQuist Inc., a leading provider of technology-enabled clinical documentation services, today announced that it has signed an agreement with Nuance Communications, Inc. (Nuance) under which MedQuist will now license Nuance's SpeechMagic speech recognition engine and processing software for use in SpeechQ of General Medicine(TM), MedQuist's front-end speech recognition application for all medical disciplines. SpeechMagic currently powers MedQuist's SpeechQ for Radiology(TM) application, used by thousands of radiologists to streamline the documentation process. SpeechQ eliminates, in most cases, the vast majority of transcription costs while reducing report turnaround time and time spent documenting so that the physician can focus on patient care.

06 December 2009 – TMC.net

INX, Inc. recently announced it was recognized by Cisco Systems as an “Advanced Technology Provider” of Cisco’s Unified Customer Voice Portal solution. In addition, the company announced it has been accepted by Cisco Systems as a Cisco Unified Customer Voice Portal Advanced Technology Provider. Cisco Unified Customer Voice Portal or “CVP,” delivers widely accepted and cost efficient self-service and agent assisted service offerings to an enterprise’s consumers. CVP facilitates customers to effectively and easily repossess the data they require from a central customer contact center using the services of automated and smart self-service using either touch screen input or speech recognition technology.

24 November 2009 – Reuters

Inventor Judah Klausner filed suit against Motorola Inc and Research In Motion, alleging infringement of technology patents related to visual voicemail. Visual voicemail lets phone users see who has left a voicemail and choose which messages they want to listen to. Klausner's Klausner Technologies Inc has won settlements in the past from Apple Inc and LG Electronics.

22 November 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced that it has extended its relationship with Mio Technology, which develops and markets products including personal navigation devices, to meet the latest developments in mobile services with Nuance Vocalizer for Automotive text-to-speech. As part of the relationship, Mio will bring Nuance’s text-to-speech to a broader range of its personal navigation devices. Nuance Vocalizer for Automotive is optimized for personal navigation devices and will enable Mio’s customers to enjoy the ease and convenience of a speech-enabled mobile experience from behind the wheel.

22 November 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, an Alcatel-Lucent company, is now accepting nominations for the fifth annual Customer Innovation Awards, a program designed to recognize the world's most innovative customer service organizations. Judged annually by more than 20 top industry analysts who closely follow the customer service industry, the Genesys Customer Innovation Awards are one of the most significant global assessments of state-of-the-art advancements among organizations providing rich customer interactions and taking an integrated approach to service customer.

22 November 2009 – PRNewswire

The IVO Software company, in cooperation with Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB), the largest British charity organization, is introducing two English speaking voices, based on revolutionary IVONA Text-to-Speech technology. They will be set up in products and services provided by RNIB to more than two million visually impaired persons. "The IVO Software has delivered amazing quality and innovation in an area that we are particularly keen to support and the partnership between our companies is set to deliver the best synthetic speech solutions on the market. We are proud to have met the team at IVO Software who have worked extremely hard and thoroughly - their focus is on quality and this shows in every element of our partnership." - said Steve Tyler, Head of Innovation, Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB), United Kingdom.

22 November 2009 – SPEECH Community

Vodafone Turkey received "The Best Call Center Technology Solution" award for its new Voice Signature Service, powered by PerSay VocalPassword. PerSay VocalPassword is a biometric speaker verification system that verifies a speaker during an interaction with an IVR or a voice application. The system at Vodafone was successfully integrated with Avaya Voice Portal Platform, enabling secure self service applications such as GSM PUK (Personal Unlocking Key) reset and access to Vodafone Call Centers.

22 November 2009 – RFP Connect

ADTRAN, Inc. and Innovation Technologies Worldwide, Inc., announced that they are teaming to bring voice communications to the hospitality industry. Innovation Technologies, a provider of voice and data solutions for lodging providers, will now offer ADTRAN's NetVanta and Total Access VoIP solutions as a complement to its ComXchange Hospitality IP-PBX software. Innovation Technologies selected ADTRAN as a complementary solution based on ADTRAN's reputation for quality and reliability, interoperability, industry-leading warranties and unique features such as Voice Quality Monitoring.

22 November 2009 – IT World Canada

Since its inception, Google Voice has offered a wide range of features for managing your phone calls, with one glaring exception: calls passing through Google Voice have to be directed to another phone number if you actually want to answer them. This gap may now have been closed with last week's announcement that Google Inc. is acquiring Gizmo5, also known as the Gizmo Project. As currently implemented, Google Voice in conjunction with Gizmo allows you to place unlimited free calls to the United States and Canada (and cheap rates elsewhere), but requires you to maintain two separate accounts. Launch the Gizmo software on your Mac to log into your Gizmo account, then fire up your browser to log into Google Voice; calls placed in Google Voice can be redirected to ring your Gizmo account before connecting to the person you're calling.

11 November 2009 – CNN Money

Cisco today announced significant product introductions across all categories of its collaboration portfolio. The company also announced its entrance into two new markets, enterprise social software and hosted email, with the goal of bringing the collaborative power of online social communities to businesses. Also announced today, new medianet-enabled products deliver better collaborative experiences for end-users across heterogeneous devices, applications and clients. A medianet is an intelligent network optimized for rich media. New media processing engine solutions offer speech-to-text transcription and provide real-time video transcoding, enabling any content to be shared across the network to any end-point device, including HD interoperability for Cisco TelePresence.

11 November 2009 – 4RFV

Mexico's Televisa Deportes Network (TDN) and Argentina's Supercanal are the first Latin American broadcasters to take advantage of SysMedia's WinCAPS subtitling technology and its advanced speech input tools. Both deals have been overseen by SysMedia's regional partner Icareus. TDN, part of Televisa, is a new pay-TV sports channel initially available in Mexico, Central America and Caribbean. The network has installed and is successfully using SysMedia's using SysMedia's WinCAPS software - including speech input technology - to create subtitles for international sports content.

07 November 2009 – TMC.net

With plans to supply its VSS system to both Convergys and Voxeo, providers of interactive voice response or “IVR” solutions, Bharatbook.com recently included a new report on “TradeHarbor Partners with Voxeo and Convergys Analyst Opinion” in its market report catalog. Voice biometrics is a technology that verifies the identity of a caller by matching the resonance and pitch of his or her voice to a database of pre-recorded utterances. The technology powers voice authentication solutions.

27 October 2009 – Materials Handling World

Trespass, the privately owned sportswear leisure brand, has selected Vocollect Voice technology to be implemented by VoiteQ at its Glasgow-based distribution facility. VoiteQ's VoiceMan middleware will interface into the Microsoft Dynamics AX Warehouse Management System (WMS), recently installed by Microsoft Gold Certified Dynamics AX specialists, Integrys Solutions. Trespass believes the new Voice solution will enable the company to increase productivity and accuracy in its warehouse, providing many significant efficiency gains and cost savings in the operation.

25 October 2009 – PRWeb

me2me AG, supplier of web and voice services, and MeMeMe Inc, provider of automatic speech-to-text transcription, have joined forces to deliver fully automated voice-to-SMS. Through this partnership agreement, MeMeMe will power me2me applications with its natural language speech-to-text recognition platform while me2me AG will distribute MeMeMe services in Europe.

25 October 2009 – Investor Ideas

VoiceCash, a leading provider of Prepaid and Money Transfer payment products, today announced, it has hired former MasterCard General Manager Mohamed Belarj as its regional CEO for Middle East operations. "We are very pleased that we've been able to persuade Belarj to join our team", says Michael Kramer, CEO of the Voice Cash Group. The International VoiceCash Group, specializes in international mobile money transfer. The company already issues a prepaid MasterCard twin-card for the German market.

25 October 2009 – SPEECH Community

Improving customer satisfaction, offering personalized services, raising security levels, and maintaining cost control, are just some of the few elements that need to be taken into account when designing voice and contact center applications. Voice Biometrics technology is part of the answer to all these concerns. This technology is applicable across multiple verticals utilizing diversified applications and communication channels.

25 October 2009 – Reuters

SRI International, an independent nonprofit research and development institute, announced today that Dr. Elizabeth Shriberg, a senior researcher in SRI's Speech Technology and Research (STAR) Laboratory, has been named a Fellow of the International Speech Communication Association (ISCA). The award, recently announced at Interspeech 2009 in Brighton, England, recognizes significant contributions to the field of speech communication science and technology. Shriberg was honoured for her fundamental research contributions to computational modeling of disfluencies, prosody in speech understanding,and higher-level features in speaker recognition.

25 October 2009 – PRWeb

Converged Communications Systems, LLC, one of Chicago's premier voice and data communications providers, is extending its services to the Nortel Network, covering Nortel phone systems and their attended information technology infrastructure. Converged Communications Systems brings extensive background in the data communications and systems integration decision space, with decades of experience in IT consolidation and services. They're expanding their focus to handle the underserved Nortel phone services market in the Midwest, and bringing their long standing traditions of excellent customer service and technical expertise to the table.

14 October – TMC.net

Convergys Corporation, a global leader in relationship management, announced today that Utah's Department of Transportation (UDOT) has renewed its contract for Convergys' On-Demand Speech Self Service solution for 10 additional years. In July 2000, the Federal Communications Commission assigned the telephone number 511 for nationwide access to traveler information services. Utah was one of the early adopter states in implementing a 511 service for traveler information, and was the first state to deploy a voice-activated 511 system.

14 October 2009 – Call Centre Clinic

The self service voice portal for Ikea by the Stuttgart-based provider Excelsis won the Voice Award in the category "Best Enterprise Service-Award". The Voice Award is known as hallmark for intelligent voice portals and awards the best German-speaking applications and its providers every year. The jury nominated the Ikea self service portal in three categories: Best Practice Award, Best Innovation Award and Best Enterprise Service-Award.

14 October 2009 – PR Newswire

Santrax is Sandata's patented time and attendance product and the nation's number one telephone and web-based field management solution. Santrax enables home care agencies to automatically verify that their staff is in the right place at the right time and to capture tasks being performed, ensuring compliance with the prescribed plan of care and ensuring that patients are receiving the highest quality of care. In addition, Santrax is able to utilize voice biometrics to further verify the identity of the home care worker, provide alerts when a home care worker does not show up within a specified time frame and track employee mileage.

14 October 2009 – TMC.net

Telephonetics VIP, a provider of speech recognition and voice automation solutions, has charted out a new Partner Recruitment Campaign that will help the company strengthen its routes to market; aid its prospective partners achieve success in their respective core markets; and drive the future of speech self-service. Telephonetics VIP claims that it works in conjunction with a variety of well established channel to market partners to aid delivery of their global business solutions. In order to get accredited to the company partners will have to face strict approvals process to ensure that they will provide the same standard and quality of service that Telephonetics VIP adhere to in order to exceed customers’ expectations.

14 October 2009 – Reuters

Spoken Communications Inc., the hybrid voice technology innovator, today announced it has bought the voicemail transcription service from GotVoice. The voicemail transcription service uses revolutionary free-form speech recognition technology designed specifically for voicemail content, to deliver voicemail-to-text conversions with unparalleled accuracy and speed. It requires no infrastructure upgrades or capital outlays.

14 October 2009 – The Washington Post

IVR and VoIP provider Voxeo has acquired Motorola's VoiceXML browser business, including full rights to Motorola’s "VoxGateway" VoiceXML browser, for an undisclosed amount. VoiceXML is an XML application that formats voice dialogues between a human and a computer. It allows for voice applications to be developed and deployed similarly to the way HTML is used for visual applications.

26 September 2009 – BBC

UK voice-to-text firm Spinvox has been "put up for sale", according to one of its investors. Investment firm Invesco Perpetual also said it had "written down" the value of its investment in the company. Spinvox, which aims to convert voice messages into text messages using advanced speech recognition software, has declined to comment.

26 September 2009 – Pocket-Lint

Google has accused Apple of lying to the US government over the Google Voice application being rejected for inclusion in Apple's App store. The claims come as Google backtracks on its FCC filing over the incident asking for previously redacted content to be made publicly available. "When we submitted our letter on August 21, we asked the FCC to redact certain portions that involved sensitive commercial conversations between two companies - namely, a description of e-mails, telephone conversations, and in-person meetings between executives at Google and Apple", Google says in a statement.

26 September 2009 – SPEECH Community

Comviva, the leading provider of integrated value added services for operators in emerging markets today announced that it has engaged Nuance Communications, Inc, the leading provider of speech and imaging solutions, to build a speech-based song search application for telecom service providers in India. The application, due for release in October 2009 and named ‘Song Search’, will significantly enhance the usability of music search applications on mobile phones, allowing users to access music content with the power of their voice.

26 September 2009 – TMC.net

Ifbyphone has announced it received three prestigious awards honouring the company’s contributions to the IP telephony and Speech Technology markets. The awards from TMC’s INTERNET TELEPHONY magazine, the Ifbyphone IP Contact Center Technology Pioneer Award and the Excellence Award for Outbound IVR honor the company for providing “the best of the best” including the most admirable feature sets and the best track records of dramatically improving the operations of today's call centers.

15 September 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Yesterday officially marked the end of the bidding process for Nortel’s Enterprise Solutions Group, and, as expected, Avaya came in as the top bidder with its offer of $475 million. Avaya entered into a “stalking horse” agreement to purchase Nortel’s enterprise business in July, more than six months after Nortel filed for bankruptcy. Several other companies, including Aspect Software and Siemens, were rumored to have been interested in its enterprise solutions business.

15 September 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

ClickFox partnered and completed integration with Greenplum Software, the provider of Enterprise Data Cloud solutions for data warehousing and analytics. According to Anna Convery, CMO at ClickFox, the deal was the result of two initiatives: requests by customers and prospects to provide massive scalability and ClickFox’s research and development strategy to expand technology and solutions by the integration of best-of-breed solutions.

12 September 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced that Vonage has chosen Nuance to be their exclusive provider for voicemail-to-text transcription in support of the new Vonage World plan. Nuance’s Voicemail to Text platform converts Vonage customers’ voicemails into text messages or emails that are sent directly to their PC or mobile phones, allowing them to easily read voicemail messages wherever, however and whenever they want.

12 September 2009 – Your story

Ditech Networks, a global leader in mobile voice processing solutions, today announced that Bandwidth.com, a nationwide CLEC and business voice provider, has chosen Ditech as one of a select group of telephony-focused developers for its newly launched Developer Sandbox Program. Ditech’s toktok Voice Web technology is being piloted on Bandwidth.com’s VoIP network to give developers and beta users the opportunity to have first hand experience with the benefits of toktok’s anytime voice-enabled access integrated into enterprise applications. Ditech and Bandwidth.com will demonstrate this groundbreaking technology live at ClueCon Telephony Developer’s Conference in Chicago, August 4-6, 2009.

02 September 2009 – Reuters

Nexidia, the market-leading provider of audio search and speech analytics
solutions, today announced that it has been named the Winner of the 2009 Speech Technology magazine Market Leader Award in the Speech Analytics category for the third consecutive year. Further extending its reputation for delivering the most powerful, flexible and affordable speech analytics solutions in the market, Nexidia was presented with the prestigious award at the magazine`s 15th Annual SpeechTEK Conference and Exposition held in New York City from August 24-26.

02 September 2009 – Gold Coast

GOLD Coast technology company Simptel Communications is on the cusp of becoming a major force in banking security. The company is negotiating with the Federal Government over its patented voice-recognition technology as part of a new assault on cyber and banking fraud. The technology has been developed by Gold Coast businessman Danny Simpson, who has sold the intellectual property rights to the automated technology to Simptel. Simptel is an unlisted public company, headed by Mr Simpson, and owned by a small band of Gold Coast investors, including the Simpson family.

02 September 2009 – Information Week

Allvoice Developments US, a provider of speech recognition systems, and mobile software developer EMG Technology both filed suits against Microsoft in recent days in the U.S. District Court for Eastern Texas, where judge Leonard Davis a week ago ruled in favor of Toronto-based i4i in its action against Microsoft. Allvoice claims that speech recognition support built into Windows XP and Windows Vista violates its patent on the technology. Allvoice also alleges that Microsoft discussed using its technology in Windows but later rejected it. Allvoice is seeking unspecified damages against Microsoft.

28 August 2009 – Business Wire

Today at SpeechTEK, the VoiceXML Forum, a global industry organization focused on accelerating the adoption of VoiceXML, speech recognition and related technologies and standards, announced that Avaya and Convergys Corporation have joined as Sponsor Members of the VoiceXML Forum and have been named to its Board of Directors. Avaya and Convergys join other Sponsor Members Cisco, Genesys, Holly Connects, Loquendo, Nuance, Verizon and West Corporation on the Board of Directors in providing strategic direction and leadership to the Forum.

28 August 2009 – Business Wire

Speech Technology magazine has announced the 2009 Speech Industry Awards for leadership and superior performance. Recipients were recognized today at the annual SpeechTEK Conference and Exposition which last through Thursday at the New York Marriott Marquis. SpeechTEK is the speech technology industry’s annual showcase of new products and services. Leading companies from all over the world attend to demonstrate the latest innovations, strategies and applications using speech technology.

28 August 2009 – Marketwire

Avaya Inc., a leader in business communications applications, systems and services, today announced an expansion of its relationship with Loquendo, a global speech technology provider and leading innovator in speech recognition. This strategic relationship will provide Avaya customers with new and enhanced speech self-service options for a broad range of advanced contact center solutions.

19 August 2009 – Business Wire

Paul Greenberg and Jeffery F. Rayport, experts in the use of speech technology for improving business practices and customer service, will keynote this year’s SpeechTEK Conference and Exposition, August 24-26 at the New York Marriott Marquis. The theme for this year’s conference is Speech in the Enterprise and the keynote speakers were selected for their leadership and expertise in customer interactions and improving enterprise efficiency, productivity, profitability, and customer relationships.

19 August 2009 – Business Wire

The SpeechTEK Conference and Exposition is the speech technology industry's premier event focusing on products, services, applications, solutions and innovations. The annual trade show and educational conference attracts a global network of speech technology providers and enterprise network customers who develop and implement speech solutions. SpeechTEK (www.speechtek.com) opens Monday, August 24 at the New York Marriott Marquis. Many companies use the SpeechTEK Expo as a platform for introducing their newest products and innovations. Next generation applications in customer service, call centers and other automated business practices will be on display.

14 August 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., today announced that its predictive text and embedded mobile speech software were both named to VisionMobile’s 100 Million Club for the second half of 2008. The VisionMobile 100 Million Club recognizes software businesses that have succeeded in establishing a significant presence in the mobile handset market, specifically those whose products have been embedded on more than 100 million mobile phones.

05 August 2009 – SPEECH Community

Eckoh plc, the UK’s largest provider of hosted speech recognition services, today announces that it has won a new five year contract worth a minimum value of £1.5m, but which is expected to generate significantly higher revenues over the contract term. The contract is to provide automated telephone services using Eckoh’s advanced speech recognition technology on behalf of a major Government Transport & Infrastructure organisation and the first service is expected to launch later this year.

05 August 2009 – TMC.net

Fonix announced the addition of four new members to its board of directors. The four - Steven G. Jones, Barry G. Jordan, Gilbert R. Steedley and Von H. Whitby - offer professional experience in financial and M&A matters and operating consolidation in the embedded speech and voice recognition technology marketplace.

31 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a leading provider of speech solutions, and IBM, a pioneer in speech technology, today announced that the companies have entered into a comprehensive Joint Initiative Agreement to further accelerate innovation and advanced speech recognition solutions for enterprises, consumers and partners worldwide. This new partnership builds upon the technology and IP collaboration between the companies announced earlier this year.

31 July 2009 – Business Wire

Envision Telephony, Inc., a leading global provider of workforce optimization (WFO) solutions for the contact center and enterprise announced today that Technology Marketing Corporation (TMC) has named Envision as a recipient of Customer Interaction Solutions 2009 Speech Technology Excellence Award for Envision Interaction IQ , a right-sized speech analytics solution that simplifies the processing, search and reporting of speech data from within audio recordings. Customer Interaction Solutions magazine has been the leading publication in CRM, call centers and teleservices since 1982 .

31 July 2009 – PR News Wire

Carnegie Speech, the global provider of software for assessing and teaching spoken-language to non-native speakers, today announced a strategic partnership and technology development agreement with In-Q-Tel, the independent strategic investment firm that identifies innovative technology solutions to support the mission of the CIA and the broader U.S. Intelligence Community. Carnegie Speech's exclusive global license to speech recognition and artificial intelligence technologies from Carnegie Mellon University enables cost-effective, scalable and personalized spoken-language assessment and training that maximizes language learning effectiveness while minimizing training time.

22 July 2009 – Venture Beat

Spinvox, the voice-to-text startup, has been on a roll: $100 million in funding from an impressive list of backers; then, a key deal with Telefonica covering its Latin America mobile operations, which bump its userbase to 150 milion (with some other contracts it claims it has yet to announce); and just yesterday, 600 registrations for its API set, which is getting the service embedded with other fast-growing mobile applications like Audioboo.

22 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced that it has been accepted as a member of the Symbian Foundation, enabling Nuance to further develop and deploy innovative mobile solutions that enhance and simplify devices based on the Symbian operating system (OS). Symbian provides the world’s leading open mobile OS, shipping in over 250 million mobile devices to date.

22 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc, a leading supplier of speech solutions, today announced that University of California, San Diego Medical Center (UCSD Medical Center) selected Dragon Medical for use at multiple facilities to expand physicians’ options for documenting electronic health records (EHRs) to include real-time speech recognition. With Dragon Medical, physicians can document patient encounters via their voice for editing in real-time, without the need for medical transcription or reliance on typing and mouse navigation to complete an EHR.

17 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Eckoh, the UK’s largest provider of hosted speech recognition services, is pleased to announce it has successfully renewed its exclusive contract for a three year period to provide a speech-enabled cinema information and ticket booking service and live contact centre to Vue, the UK’s leading developer and operator of state-of-the-art cinemas. Under the terms of the contract, in Autumn 2009, Eckoh will deploy a completely new automated telephone service which is being designed to reflect the same innovative approach that Vue bring to the cinema market as a whole.

17 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced it has expanded its Mobile Division voice services portfolio with the acquisition of Jott. Jott is the innovator behind the popular Jott Assistant, the simple and easy-to-use service that enables users to create notes, set reminders and appointments, send email and text messages, and post to their favorite web services – all by voice, from any device.

17 July 2009 – The Telecom

Three UK local authorities have been commended for using Telephonetics VIP speech automation at this year’s Good Communication Awards. Wandsworth, Swale and Hertfordshire councils were commended at the awards, which seek to recognise excellence in public sector communications. Wandsworth Borough Council was recognised for using speech automation to set up direct debit council tax payments. Since the system was set up, Wandsworth has seen a 40% increase in customers opting to pay by direct debit.

17 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc., an Alcatel-Lucent company, announced that market research firm Gartner, Inc. evaluated Genesys’ GVP 8.0 solution and gave Genesys a ‘Strong Positive’ rating in its new report, "MarketScope for IVR Systems and Enterprise Voice Portals," published June 15, 2009, and authored by Jay Lassman and Bern Elliot. The report evaluated nine vendors and Genesys received the highest possible rating a vendor could achieve in this report: a Strong Positive rating. A vendor with a Strong Positive rating is viewed by Gartner as “a provider of strategic products, services or solutions.”

03 July 2009 – SPEECH Community

Forrester Research, an independent research company, issued a comprehensive report that evaluates premise-based IVRs and voice portals, key technologies used in customer service. This report, The Forrester Wave: Premise-Based IVR/Voice Portals, Q2 2009, Elizabeth Herrell, June 17, 2009, named Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company, as a “Leader” and Genesys received top marks in each of the three major categories: Current Offering; Strategy; and Market Presence.

03 July 2009 – PR Newswire

NICE Systems, a leading global provider of advanced solutions that enable organizations to extract insight from interactions to drive performance, today announced that leading industry analyst firm Datamonitor recognized NICE's worldwide leadership position in its 2009 contact center analytics market report "Decision Matrix: Selecting a Contact Center Analytics Vendor (Competitor Focus); Analytics and reporting as differentiators in a difficult economy." NICE's contact center analytics offering, which includes its performance management and interaction analytics solutions, achieved high scores for every category in the technical assessment section, coming in significantly ahead of its competitors, with consistent technical excellence. NICE also achieved top ratings for its significant market impact, high rating by customers, and has been placed in the highest ranked 'shortlist' category.

03 July 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

According to two new “Forrester Wave” reports from analysis firm Forrester Research, Nuance Communications and TellMe were the leading providers of network-based interactive voice response (IVR) systems/voice portals this year, while Genesys, Avaya, Cisco Systems, and Nortel Networks led premise-based IVRs/voice portals.

03 July 2009 – Call Centre Helper

HP and Alcatel-Lucent have signed a relationship agreement establishing both parties’ intent to form a 10-year global alliance to help customers leverage the convergence of telecommunication and IT. Once the definitive agreement has been executed, the companies will jointly market solutions and capabilities that enable end-to-end transformation for service providers and enterprises.

23 June 2009 – SPEECH Community

At its annual eScription user meeting, Nuance Communications, Inc., a leading supplier of speech solutions, gave special recognition to its 2009 eScription customer Million Dollar Award recipients. Twenty healthcare organizations from across the U.S. were acknowledged for saving one million dollars or more in transcription costs as a result of implementing the eScription platform for computer aided medical transcription (CAMT). Also at the event, two organizations received the annual productivity award, which is presented to eScription customers with in-house medical transcriptionists (MTs) that achieved an average productivity gain over the past year of more than 125 percent.

23 June 2009 – SPEECH Community

SpeechStorm, the specialist provider of phone self-service solutions, has today announced that its middle east based customer, Etisalat, has been recognised as one of the world’s top innovators in customer service by an international group of industry experts in the fourth annual Customer Innovation Awards, sponsored by Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company.

19 June 2009 – Web Wire

Daon, the award-winning global provider of identity assurance software and services, announced today that Agnitio has joined a growing number of biometric technology companies who are strengthening their market position by integrating with the global leader in biometrics platforms. DaonAdvantage is an exciting solution partner program which provides a structured, yet lightweight model through which Daon’s partners can integrate their technologies directly into Daon’s industry leading product suite using a purpose built integration and testing framework. Once integrated by the partner, Daon tests and certifies the integration. Partners benefit by gaining access to the broad suite of functionality provided by the Daon platform enabling them to offer stronger, more comprehensive solutions to the market.

19 June 2009 – SPEECH Community

A recent report by independent market analysis firm Datamonitor “Decision Matrix – Selecting an IP Contact Center Vendor,” provides a comparative analysis of the top IP contact center vendors in the enterprise market. Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) and its subsidiary Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc. is one of only two vendors whose IP solutions Datamonitor recommends enterprise’s place on their shortlist for IP contact center selection.

19 June 2009 – TMC.net

Voxeo Corporation, a leading provider of premise and hosted Unified Communications and Self-Service platforms, today announced that Evolv On-Demand, a leader in human capital recruiting and hiring for call centers, is using Voxeo's hosted Interactive Voice Response (IVR) platform in its cost-saving, next-generation hiring solutions for the call and contact center industry.

05 June 2009 – TMC.net

Leveraging speech technology to help call centers better manage agent performance, a pair of British companies today announced a partnership that will combine phonetic audio searches and analytics on recordings. Officials at Kent’s ComputerTel – which specializes in voice, call recording and monitoring and quality monitoring agent evaluation software – say they’re looking to Aurix, a company based in Worcestershire, to help them leverage phonetic audio search technology so that contact centers can record, monitor and perform speech analytics.

05 June 2009 – PR Newswire

SVOX, the leading provider of embedded speech solutions, today announced that it has joined forces with Open Handset Alliance members to enable speech user interfaces on the Android platform, according to SVOX CEO Martin Reber. SVOX has joined the Open Handset Alliance and shares the Alliance's vision to develop an open, complete and free platform for mobile devices. The company will enrich the mobile experience of consumers by contributing an industry-leading speech output solution known under its development name SVOX Pico.

05 June 2009 – TMC.net

Targeting an increasingly popular means of communication that’s finding its way into large enterprises for its cost-savings capability, an Orlando-based unified communications and self-service platforms provider today announced that it’s acquired a company that helps developers build IM solutions into applications. Officials at Voxeo Corporation told TMCnet in an interview that their acquisition of IMified is a natural extension of their flagship interactive voice response, or “IVR” solutions.

05 June 2009 – SPEECH Community

The focus of the new partnership with Genesys is on VoiceXML solutions. The award-winning voice user interface design and professional voice dialogs by CreaLog experts is now also available for the Genesys Contact Center Suite. CreaLog customized solutions and the established CreaLog industry and standard solutions are offered to Genesys customers.

27 May 2009 – The Seattle Times

Mike McCue, the cofounder of TellMe, announced today that he is leaving Microsoft's speech-recognition subsidiary. Zig Serafin, a general manager for Microsoft's speech components group, will be taking McCue's job and bringing together TellMe's 330 employees in Mountain View, California, together with another 80 people in Microsoft working on speech technology in Redmond and in Beijing, China.

27 May 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

At Interop Las Vegas 2009, HP and Microsoft announced a four-year strategic global initiative to deliver an end-to-end unified communications and collaboration solution. This is planned to span software, hardware, networking, and services, and would enable customers to improve business output and reduce travel, telecom, and IT operating costs. This would be accomplished by streamlining communications across messaging, video, and voice with connected applications and devices.

27 May 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Vangard Voice Systems announced the company's partnership with Z-Space Technologies, a company specializing in software development for portable mobile data collection applications on mobile handheld computers. Z-Space will integrate Vangard's AccuSpeechMobile voice technology into its ITScriptNet platform solution for speeding development of mobile data collection applications, thus delivering new voice-driven high-productivity capabilities to ITScriptNet mobile applications.

22 May 2009 – PRWeb

Today Voxeo, the world's leading provider of standards-based voice application platforms and hosted services, announced it has been named as one of only two companies on Datamonitor's "shortlist" of IVR vendors. The shortlist is contained in Datamonitor's new and independently published report, "Decision Matrix: Selecting an IVR Vendor in the Enterprise," and includes detailed analysis of the IVR provider market, highlighting the two companies, Voxeo and Genesys, that Datamonitor analysis confirms are the strongest providers.

07 May 2009 – Earth Times

Convergys Corporation , a global leader in relationship management, announced today that IP Integration, a leading UK systems integrator, has entered into a partnership to resell Convergys’ award-winning Interactive Voice Response (IVR) voice portal and speech automation solutions to the UK contact center marketplace.

07 may 2009 – Fierce VoIP

Microsoft subsidiary Tellme announced it will offer Global Crossing VoIP service and improved call automation as part of its contact center offering. Tellme claims a customer can save up to 60 percent per minute by using the Global Crossing offering for its contact center, while also eliminating transfer costs and lowering costs additionally with access to local number service.

07 May 2009 – Earth Times

Cepstral LLC today announced a strategic partnership with Anshe Chung Studios Ltd. (ACS), a leading developer and distributor of virtual goods in 3D online environments. The deal enables Virtual World users to have their avatars speak in the voice of their choosing, by typing what they want the avatar to say. Cepstral serves the audio from its hosted (SaaS) platform at VoiceForge.com. Currently VoiceForge offers the world's largest catalog of over 50 unique English voices, allowing users to have their avatar speak with the personality they choose. Voices range from novelty accents like Evil-Genius, Dallas, Top-Hat, Belle, and Vixen to classic young adults, American and British.

28 April 2009 – TopNews.in

OnMobile Global Ltd and Vodafone Group have entered into an agreement to deploy OnMobile's Ringback Tones, Voice Portal and Speech-enabled Value Added Services to the Vodafone Group emerging markets operating companies. The agreement enables Vodafone operators and Partner Networks across the world to rapidly deploy OnMobile's products which have achieved remarkable success for Vodafone in the fast growing Indian VAS market.

28 April 2009 – 4G Wireless Evolution

TradeHarbor Inc., a leading provider of voice authentication services, and Voxeo Corporation, a leading provider of premise and hosted Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, today announced a partnership to deliver TradeHarbor's Voice Signature ServiceSM to any customer using Voxeo's IVR services.

28 April 2009 – i Newswire

top-VOX UK, suppliers of Pick by Voice systems for the logistics industry, announces it has signed a new partnership agreement with SnapOnDemand Solutions, globally renowned for developing and implementing award winning WMS (warehouse management system) solutions, such as Snapfulfil.

24 April 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company, today announced a key initiative, called Cross Channel Conversations, designed to eliminate the silos between traditional contact centers, the Web and nextgeneration communication channels. The new initiative, launched at its annual G-Force conference, will result in solutions that bring together critical elements of the contact center; enterprise resources in the branch and back office; and virtual technologies, including the Web, chat, SMS, video, avatars, virtual assistants and smartphones with mobile applications.

24 April 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company, and InQuira Inc. today announced the integration of their respective software suites – enabling consumers to now have a seamless consistent experience when they interact with a company’s contact center regardless of the communication channel they use. By combining Genesys’ best-in-breed customer interaction software with InQuira’s knowledge-management applications, this joint solution builds tremendous value into every eService experience and supports customers’ desires to use non-voice channels on the web and mobile for customer support.

24 April 2009 – SPEECH Community

SpeechStorm, the specialist provider of phone self-service solutions for contact centres,has today announced that it has appointed three sales professionals and a new marketing manager to support its growth strategy across Europe. SpeechStorm continues to grow its share of the phone self service solutions market and has also recently showcased the latest, innovative addition to its product portfolio, Visual IVR; an interactive video and voice application that is set to transform the way businesses communicate with their customers and generate a range of new business revenue channels.

24 April 2009 – Opus Research

While I would like the acronym “VAS” to stand for “Voice-Activated Services”, it really stands for mobile “Value Added Services.” In Vodafonese, it refers to the set of VAS include ring-back tones, voice portal and speech enabled services that will now be based on a VAS server from OnMobile Global, one of the largest providers of “white label” mobile services.

15 April 2009 – Information Week

Nuance Communications this week completed its $35 million acquisition of Zi Corp. and will incorporate Zi's mobile search technology into its suite of services. This ends a sometimes-bitter acquisition process that began last August when Nuance offered twice the trading value of Zi's stock price. Zi resisted the offer, which led to a hostile takeover bid, as well as a patent lawsuit. The deal was eventually consummated for about $17 million in cash and $18 million in stock, and Zi's management encouraged stockholders to approve the deal.

09 April 2009 – Opus Research

As part of its long-standing plans for global expansion, Enghouse Systems Limited, parent company for Syntellect, completed its acquisition of Trio AB, an enterprise solutions provider founded in 1992. Trio provides voice processing and call processing platforms for enterprises in Scandinavia. While it was founded in 1992, it had been acquired by Teligent AB in 2006 as a premises-based offering from a value added service provider. Teligent put Trio up for sale in late 2008.

09 April 2009 – TMC.net

NEC Infrontia, a developer and provider of advanced key systems and point of sale solutions, reportedly announced that Active Voice has transitioned and is now a division of NECII. The restructuring is expected to help NECII and Active Voice to consolidate their strengths, and the new division will continue developing and provide Active Voice products to its dealer channels and end users, including the Repartee and Kinesis Unified Messaging brands.

09 April 2009 – PRWeb

VEXIS Systems, a leading integrator of voice solutions for call centers and enterprises, and Voice Architects, the leading independent supplier of speech technology services, today announced that they had joined the two firms in a merger acquisition led by VEXIS. The combined organization will offer platform-independent speech services as well as complete line of enterprise and contact center voice products, solutions and services. Voice Architects will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of VEXIS that will be known as VEXIS Voice Architects. Keith Rolle, Managing Member of Voice Architects, has been appointed VEXIS Chief Designer, and will lead the speech efforts for both divisions.

01 April 2009 – FoxBusiness

Neverfail, a leading global software company providing affordable continuous availability and disaster recovery solutions, today announced a new OEM licensing agreement with unified communications solution provider Applied Voice & Speech Technologies, Inc. Under the terms of the agreement, AVST will OEM Neverfail technology to provide high availability and disaster recovery for system server components in CallXpress 8, the latest version of AVST's unified communications platform. The news was announced today at VoiceCon Orlando 2009 and follows Neverfail's recently announced OEM deal with VMware that incorporates Neverfail's high availability and failover protection into VMware vCenter Server Heartbeat, a new VMware server virtualization product.

23 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

ConverTec Inc., a global oriented telecom software company with focus on the Small to Medium Business (SMB) market, and Loquendo, the global provider of speech technologies, today announced that Loquendo’s speech engines have been chosen to speech-enable new innovative telecom solutions. “Virtual Attendant” and “Virtual Assistant” are the first in a suite of speech-enabled solutions that are scheduled for release later this year on Nortel’s Business Communications Manager (BCM) and Avaya’s IP Office platforms. “We are combining our artificial intelligence technology with Loquendo’s superb Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) and Text to Speech (TTS) technologies to deliver a more natural and “human like” experience for callers” explains Doug Moffat, president of ConverTec. “Callers will have a difficult time distinguishing between our Virtual Attendant and a live person”, said Doug.

23 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc., an Alcatel-Lucent company, and VEXIS Systems, Inc. has signed an agreement for VEXIS to join the Genesys Partner Program in the Strategic Partner Tier. VEXIS can now resell the entire suite of Genesys products in North America as part of a larger offering leveraging VEXIS’ expertise in contact center design, development and deployment experience, extensive customer relationships, and exceptional voice user interface expertise.

23 March 2009 – iTWire

Telstra and VeCommerce, a Salmat company, announced today they have sold a VeCommerce speech recognition solution to the NAB, with the technology designed to improve the bank’s telephone banking experience and ensuring customer enquiries are directed to the most appropriately skilled banker in the most efficient way.

18 March 2009 – Business Wire

Adacel, an industry leader in air traffic automation, simulation, speech recognition technology and software integration, announced today it has been awarded a contract from Era Systems Corporation to supply its Aurora air traffic management (ATM) system for Fiji.

18 March 2009 – msnbc

TuVox today announced the TuVox Accelerated ROI Program, which eliminates the large up front capital expenses typically associated with IVR and speech recognition upgrades, thus enabling companies to realize financial benefits sooner.

13 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Agnitio, Nauta Capital (Nauta) and Elaia Partners (Elaia) today announced that Agnitio, a leading voice biometric company headquartered in Madrid, Spain, has completed a new capital increase of € 5.5 million. This second round of funding has been led by Elaia Partners and includes a significant participation of Nauta Capital, leader of the previous funding round of € 2.7 million in December 2007. Elaia’s participation in this funding round includes a co-investment of Neotec Capital Riesgo as a consequence of their recently announced partnership.

13 March 2009 – TMC.net

HCA International, central London’s premier healthcare facility has announced it selected and deployed Nuance Communications, SpeechMagic technology in its 12 different sites around the city. Nuance’s healthcare solutions are used by more than 3,000 hospitals and 250,000 physicians and provide a comprehensive family of speech-driven clinical documentation and communication solutions so healthcare provider organizations can reduce operating costs, increase reimbursement, and enhance patient care and safety.

13 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Convergys Corporation, a global provider in relationship management, announced today that LemonIT, based in Seoul, South Korea, has agreed to sell Intervoice [R] Voice Portal solutions from Convergys. LemonIT specializes in delivering self-service IP communications and traditional TDM technology to contact centers in a variety of vertical industries including financial services and electronics. As part of the agreement, the only voice portal solutions LemonIT will have in its portfolio will be Intervoice Solutions from Convergys.

13 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a provider of speech solutions, has today announced that Air France has launched the second-phase of its popular telephone-based, speech-enabled portal, offering innovative travel services for customers around the world. The new application builds on the success of the existing Air France customer service application, powered by Nuance speech solutions and now offers services in six languages.

13 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Alcatel-Lucent today announced that it has signed a contract with Telekom Srbija, the main telecommunications operator in Serbia, to expand, extend and upgrade their existing network. This will enable the operator to expand its service offering for voice, data and broadband Internet services to more end-users, benefiting from enhanced aggregation and transport capabilities.

13 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

OnviSource, a provider of highly affordable, fully integrated call center solutions and award-winning call center business process outsourcing services, announced today that Center Partners, a specialized provider of contact center outsourced solutions within call center and eLearning, has named OnviSource strategic partner and sole provider of call recording and quality monitoring solutions throughout its multi-location enterprise.

04 March 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., and Zi Corporation today announced an agreement under which Nuance will acquire Zi for US$0.69 per share in a cash and stock transaction. Zi’s solutions for mobile search and text input complement Nuance’s portfolio of intuitive touch and speech interfaces that simplify and enhance the way people interact with mobile devices, applications, and services. Together, Nuance and Zi are positioned to better address the need for text input technology for customers and partners worldwide, especially in Asia-Pacific.

04 March 2009 – smallcapnews

Telephonetics, the speech automation specialist, has been awarded a a multi-year contract extension by Apollo Cinemas to continue supplying automatic speech recognition (ASR) ticket booking and information technology to all of their 13 UK cinema sites.

26 February 2009 – SPEECH Community

Telephonetics VIP, a provider of speech recognition and voice automation solutions, recently announced the launch of Confirmer, a scalable application to help enterprises and businesses contact groups of people and present timely information. The information can be of use in various situations such as emergencies of even day to day activities.

26 February 2009 – TMC.net

Global speech technology provider, Loquendo, has announced its congratulations for Multimodal Interaction Working Group for the publication of the Extensible MultiModal Annotation Markup Language (EMMA) as a W3C Recommendation. Designed to be a powerful language, EMMA benefits MultiModal applications, such as voice applications, by boosting performance through the provision of an enhanced interpretation of inputs through voice and other modalities. As the use of speech and voice technologies increase, EMMA has significant applications throughout the Web.

26 February 2009 – trading markets

Leading global speech recognition player Nuance recently announced that it will be purchasing some of IBM's speech technology. While the addition of IBM's source code will enable Nuance to make improvements to its embedded and network-based speech recognition technology, the acquisition and ensuing relationship has prompted questions over Nuance's technology and IBM's motives.

18 February 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced the Nuance Mobile Developers Program, designed to maximize integration opportunities for Nuance Mobile’s speech and text frameworks. The Program is optimized for leading-edge integration, platform and OEM partners that develop applications and solutions for mobile and consumer electronic devices. The Nuance Mobile Developers Program establishes an ecosystem of compelling applications by fostering innovative implementations of and seamless integrations with multiple products in Nuance’s portfolio.

18 February 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc. today announced that recent trials and deployments of the Nuance Mobile Care solution has proven to significantly reduce calls being directed to live agents by over sixty percent. Nuance Mobile Care provides users with the ability to self-solve simple problems including customer care and billing directly and instantly on the handset. This innovative care application eliminates wait times for customer service agents, creating a huge opportunity to operators worldwide to significantly reduce costs and provide a superior customer experience.

12 February 2009 – PublicTechnology.net

SRC, a provider of digital dictation and speech recognition to NHS Trusts, has been selected to deploy speech recognition to the Radiology department at Newham University Hospital NHS Trust (NUHT). The solution enables Radiologists, Sonographers and Reporting Radiographers to create documents and reports directly from voice commands and spoken words, rather than using the current time-consuming method of self-typing.

12 February 2009 - PRWeb

VoiceCorp who has been a pioneer and leader in Web 2.0, SAAS and Text To Speech technologies in Europe and Asia has entered into a relationship with Accelerant Sales Group LLC. As part of the agreement Accelerant Sales Group will manage business development, marketing and sales representation for the United States.

04 February 2009 – SPEECH Community

MicroAutomation, a leading systems integrator of call center automation solutions, and Loquendo, the global speech technology company, today announced a strategic partnership designed to help contact centers incorporate Loquendo’s high-quality multilingual speech technologies into their offerings. Through the partnership, MicroAutomation becomes the first US-based Loquendo certified partner to provide technical support and professional services for Loquendo speech products and services locally and for the Canadian market.

04 February 2009 – SPEECH Community

SpeechStorm, the specialist provider of phone self-service solutions for contact centres, has today announced that, Allied Irish Bank (AIB) has been shortlisted in the 2009 Financial Sector Technology awards for the much coveted Best Use of IT in Retail Banking award category.

04 February 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Minneapolis-based Amcom Software, a provider of mission-critical communications solutions, late yesterday acquired SDC Solutions of Manchester, N.H. Financial terms were not disclosed. The acquisition strengthens Amcom’s position in the market for call-center and emergency management software, dramatically increasing its customer base and expanding its product portfolio.

04 February 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Angel.com and SugarCRM have teamed up to launch the Angel.com SugarCRM Connector, a suite of fully-hosted interactive voice response (IVR) solutions that will phone-enable a user’s SugarCRM account. With the Angel.com SugarCRM Connector, users will be able to access, update, and manage their accounts, contacts, and leads—all via voice commands over the phone.

30 January 2009 – SPEECH Community

Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, an Alcatel-Lucent company, today announced it has acquired SDE Software Development Engineering GmbH (“SDE”). SDE’s primary product, called Genesys Customer Interaction Portal, is a web-based thin client software solution that helps service providers deliver hosted contact center capabilities, such as self-service and agent-assisted service, to enterprise customers. The customer interaction portal is a key component in Genesys’ hosted contact center solution strategy.

30 January 2009 – SPEECH Community

SVOX, the leading provider of embedded speech solutions today announced the acquisition of the Professional Speech Processing Group of Siemens AG, according to SVOX CEO Volker Jantzen. SVOX has acquired all speech technology-related IP of Siemens AG developed over 25 years, including the SpeechAdvance speech recognition product suite and more than 60 patent families. The majority of the Professional Speech Processing Group’s employees will be integrated into SVOX Deutschland GmbH in Munich. SVOX Deutschland GmbH is a fully owned subsidiary of SVOX AG.

30 January 2009 – Realwire

Telephonetics VIP, the speech recognition and voice automation specialist, is delighted to announce a new partnership with Freedom, a leading business communications specialist. Under the agreement Freedom will provide the Telephonetics VIP portfolio of speech automation solutions to customers seeking excellence in integrated customer service. Freedom is particularly strong in Telephonetics VIP’s core markets of Health and Public Sector.

30 January 2009 – Speech Technology Magazine

Yesterday, BusComm, a value-added reseller, announced that it would be partnering with CallMiner to package Eureka Essentials with another call center solution it sells for Verint Systems. Eureka, the CallMiner software, will be offered as an add-on, enhancing Verint’s native capabilities. Eureka Essentials is a speech analytics solution for small to midsize single site contact centers. The software can search up to 1,000 hours daily of recorded audio, while categorizing calls and analyzing acoustics in Web-based applications.

21 January 2009 – bmighty

Nortel has filed for bankruptcy and been delisted from the New York Stock Exchange. The news could foreshadow turbulent times for small and medium businesses as network equipment suppliers take desperate steps to remain solvent. What will happen to Nortel's assets? And how long should you do business with a supplier experiencing financial problems?

21 January 2009 – CNW Telbec

Pronexus announced today that INTERNET TELEPHONY magazine has named VBVoice 5.6 IVR ToolKit as a distinguished recipient of its 2008 Product of the Year Award. "We are honored to have been granted this awards amid the very strong competition. Our award winning product VBVoice 5.6 IVR ToolKit demonstrates our commitment and ability to delivering excellence in the Speech/Voice application development industry." said Gary T. Hannah, President and CEO of Pronexus.

21 January 2009 – the Earth Times

SpeechCycle Inc. has signed on as a Principal Sponsor of the 2009 Voice Search Conference to be held in San Diego, California from March 2 to 4, 2009. Voice Search 2009 is organized by AVIOS, a not-for-profit association of speech industry professionals, and by TMA Associates, publishers of the popular Speech Strategy News.

21 January 2009 – Modern Materials Handling

topVOX, manufacturer of a voice-directed picking system for the warehouse and distribution facilities, announced a partnership with Numina Group on Tuesday at ProMat. The partnership provides Numina Group with a speech recognition system that easily integrates into current WMS solutions - including interfaces with SAP and various ERP systems.

21 January 2009 – Trading Markets

OnviSource Inc., a provider of highly affordable, fully integrated call center software product solutions and call center outsourcing services, today announced it has been selected by Avaya Inc., a leading global provider of business communications applications, systems and services, for membership in the Avaya DevConnect program.

15 January 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a leading provider of speech solutions, and IBM, a pioneer in speech technology, today jointly announced that Nuance and IBM have entered into a licensing and technical services agreement to enhance and expand innovative speech solutions designed to better serve enterprises, consumers, carriers, and partners worldwide.

08 January 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a supplier of speech solutions, is celebrating the 100-year anniversary of Dictaphone, a technology that has evolved from sound production alongside the invention of the telephone to advanced speech recognition solutions for the healthcare industry. Today, Dictaphone is one of many components that comprise Nuance’s healthcare business, which provides speech-enabled clinical documentation and communication solutions to more than 5,000 healthcare provider organizations.

08 January 2009 – SPEECH Community

Nuance Communications, Inc., a provider of speech solutions, today announced that it powers the speech recognition capabilities of BB Softservice Corp’s SoftBank SELECTION Speeek! application for the Apple iPhone 3G. Speeek! is a voice-enabled electronic dictionary application that translates Japanese to English or Chinese.