Nuance claim 99 percent accurate speech recognition, without training

Stuart Corner
Wednesday, 19 July 2006 12:48

IT People - Training

Nuance Communications claims that version 9 of its Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech recognition software for Windows will transform PC usage as "the first desktop speech recognition software that truly eliminates the need to train the software to a user's voice."
Nuance claims tat the need to 'train most speech recognition applications was "one of the most significant issues that has caused many people to resist even trying speech recognition."

Paul Ricci, chairman and CEO of Nuance Communications, said: "with the new release, we have overcome the final obstacles to adoption and made speech as seamless as the keyboard and mouse."

Nuance claims that Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 "allows people to perform nearly any computing task by speaking with their PC." It supports "almost all Windows applications," enabling the voice to be used to input text or issue commands to an application at speeds up to 160 words per minute with accuracy levels claimed to be up to 99 percent, 20 percent higher than version 8. This, according to Nuance, is faster and more precise than typing.

The new release includes specific integration with Microsoft Office, Outlook and Internet Explorer, as well as with Corel, WordPerfect and Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking 9 also includes support for Bluetooth headsets and microphones, as well as Tablet PCs and a number of new mobile devices, giving people the freedom to dictate wirelessly or on-the-go with a PDA or digital recorder.