VOXW....ITT Industries and Voxware in Strategic Alliance for Speech Recognition Technology
FORT WAYNE, Ind. and PRINCETON, N.J., July 8 /PRNewswire/ -- ITT Industries (NYSE: IIN - news), a global engineering and industrial manufacturing company with leading positions in communications, networking and tactical voice control for the government market, announced today that it has signed a joint development, marketing and licensing agreement with Voxware, Inc. (Nasdaq: VOXW - news), a leading developer of speech recognition-based products for industrial markets. Through the agreement, ITT Industries and Voxware will cross-license their noise-robust speech recognition technology for use in military and industrial applications.
''We chose Voxware as a strategic partner in order to leverage commercial technology into our programs for military use.'' said Dr. Barry Abzug, President and General Manager of ITT Industries' Aerospace/Communications Division. ''Combining Voxware's technologies and products expands our Command Voice!(TM) product line with ''noise robust'' voice recognition technology. This will address emerging military tactical voice recognition requirements for medium to large vocabulary speaker adaptive applications''.
''ITT Industries' partnership with Voxware for noise-robust speech recognition technologies enhances our position as a leading provider of voice solutions for industrial markets,'' added Dr. Bathsheba J. Malsheen, Voxware's President and CEO. ''Warehouses, manufacturing floors and package sorting facilities are extremely noisy, and ITT Industries' selection of Voxware certainly validates that our products provide the highest accuracy today for these types of industrial applications.''
In addition to licensing and joint development agreements, Voxware and ITT have also agreed to jointly explore commercial product marketing opportunities for radio frequency, modem, and other technology from ITT's personal communications technology known as the Handheld Multimedia Terminal (HMT). ITT Industries will also make available its SpeakerKey® commercial speaker verification product to Voxware as part of the agreement.
''ITT Industries is a pioneer in developing and providing tactical voice control systems for military applications,'' noted Dr. William Meisel, editor of Speech Recognition Update based in Tarzana CA. ''As digitization adds technical features to weapons and battlefield communications systems, it is imperative soldiers be able to control them with an intuitive interface that leaves their eyes and hands free. The combination of ITT Industries Command Voice!(TM) product and Voxware technology does just that.''
Voxware will continue to focus its sales and marketing resources on its targeted industrial markets, and will evaluate and potentially incorporate technology and experience emerging from the ITT Industries relationship to strengthen its product position in the warehousing, manufacturing and package sorting market segments. Similarly, ITT Industries will continue to focus on military applications for tactical speech recognition products and technology, leveraging the Voxware relationship to provide commercial products and technology to increase its presence in the military market.
About ITT Industries
ITT Industries, Inc. (http://www.ittind.com) is a global engineering and industrial manufacturing company with leading positions in the markets that it serves: pumps and complementary products; defense products and services; connectors and switches; and specialty products. Based in White Plains, NY, ITT Industries employs approximately 33,000 people around the world. In addition to the New York Stock Exchange, ITT Industries' stock is traded on the Midwest, Pacific, London, Frankfurt and Paris exchanges. |