Bob, I think one of the things which happens to us all following fonix is that, we become surprised when others seem to be unaware of the company. I believe that a large part of the post you created and the conclusions you draw are based on this priveleged awareness.
In the larger world, even people in the industry are still unaware of the existence of an alternative technology (My own questioning of stand employees at Speechtek NYC 97 suggested the name was known but nothing about what fonix actually does). For an editor of a technology journal or speech recognition magazine, the interest value to be generated may still not be great enough to devote much time to it.
We lose sight of the outside world's lack of awareness. The relative silence of the company on the details of the technology and lack of a useful "layman's demo", has meant that we are totally dependant upon experts (who we seem to ignore so far) and feel the likelihood of a technology breakthrough is low.
On the other hand, the world of HMM has so much going on at the moment that there is hardly any space not filled with it. Even my AOL today offered me Dragon Dictate for about $99. The alternative HMM technology is good enough to be a ground breaker even though there are signs that it has a long way to go. I'm frustrated because I'm trying to recall an article I read just yesterday on the difficulties with the Dragon and IBM products, even though I'd like to try them myself.
The fonx tech, if for real, would be closer to the holy grail on virtually every point. We are beginning to get evidence that this may be so.
The Siemens deal is not insignificant on its own.The aeroplane has filled enough seats to fly for a lot longer with just this deal although we can't judge precisely how long. Any extra passengers now, may be pure profit. There are possibly some future partners who are strategically obliged to have a dominant technology who must fully appreciate the opportunity fonx represents before allowing themselves the luxury of ignoring it. I believe the apparent slow pace is a very natural in a company where there are a small number of principal deal makers.
In time it may appear that fonx went really fast. Even if they were too slow for investors taking a big gamble now. If they could catch Siemens, XXX Inc and , YYY, all within 4 years of breaking ground, it might seem remarkable. As yet though we do not have this perspective and must play our chips on our subjective opinion. I have a sense that comparing Fonx with L&H is extremely difficult. Different technology, different product strategies, different in virtually every way. Yes L&H have come a long way......with HMM.
If you buy (and many don't) the idea that fonx have something remarkably better (and why should we? Listen to the Siemens technical folks and the OGI types) then, one day, L&H may become a customer and simply replace their engine with fonx blessing, or see declining sales as L&H competitors take up the new tech and offer "fonx inside" on AOL's irritating advertising for $99.
I'm going on too much but your post seemed to be just a little unusually impatient.
Parx |
