SpeechWorks International Broadens
Distribution through Partnership With Catalyst Telecom, a Top Computer Telephony Distributor
December 17, 1998
BOSTON and CRANFORD,
N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)
New Channel Opens Market for
Over-the-telephone Speech
Recognition Applications
Spearheading the trend that is
replacing keypad menu
selections, SpeechWorks
International, Inc. (formerly
Applied Language Technologies)
and Catalyst Telecom (formerly
The CTI Authority) will jointly
market and distribute
SpeechWorks' industry-leading,
conversational speech recognition
technology. Speech recognition
applications allow callers to talk
on the phone naturally, instead of
coping with "press 1, press 2"
commands.
Under the agreement, Catalyst
Telecom, a leading full-service
distributor of computer telephony
integration (CTI) technology, will
expand its product line with the
addition of SpeechWorks(tm), an
easy-to-use and exceptionally
accurate speech recognition
system with a vocabulary of more
than 50,000 words. In addition,
the companies will co-market
SpeechWorks with direct mail,
advertising and trade show
promotions.
Catalyst Telecom already
distributes SpeechWorks(tm)
Host, a product of Dialogic
Corporation, which is an
entry-level version of the
full-fledged SpeechWorks
solution. Resellers, integrators
and developers value
SpeechWorks Host as the ideal
starting-point for small-scale
speech applications. They can
get productive applications
up-and-running quickly--without
being experts in speech
science--and without breaking
the bank.
SpeechWorks Makes it Easy
Both SpeechWorks and
SpeechWorks Host support easy
development of speech
applications with
DialogModules(tm), "building
blocks" that encapsulate
particular tasks such as capturing
a yes/no response, date or
telephone number. The
SpeechWorks products also make
speech recognition easy to use,
with natural language processing,
the ability for callers to speak in
complete phrases and sentences,
and "barge-in," the ability for
callers to interrupt prompts at
any time.
"There is a pent-up demand for
affordable, easy-to-deploy
speech recognition solutions that
resellers can use to get their
customers on board, " said
Sandra Rivera, president, CT
Division, Catalyst Telecom. "Now,
it is fast and economical for
organizations to add automated
speech response (ASR) to any
application. And because of
SpeechWorks' scalability,
applications written using
SpeechWorks Host can be easily
extended to wide-ranging
deployments with the
SpeechWorks Antares-based
solution."
"SpeechWorks Host was an
important step in making
medium-vocabulary telephone
speech recognition as easy to
deploy as digit recognition,"
noted industry analyst William S.
Meisel, Ph.D., president of TMA
Associates, a consulting and
publishing firm. "SpeechWorks'
agreement with Catalyst Telecom
continues this trend by making
large-vocabulary applications
more widely available to the
development community. The
major bottleneck to the growth of
telephone speech recognition is a
shortage of qualified developers,
and alliances like this are
progress in removing that
bottleneck."
Compatible Systems Protect
Investments
"Catalyst Telecom is one of the
largest and most respected
distributors in the computer
telephony market," said R. Todd
Barber, vice president, corporate
partnerships, SpeechWorks.
"They are in a perfect position to
take advantage of the exploding
speech market--offering VARs all
of the pieces, including Dialogic's
hardware and entry-level speech
systems, the industry's best ASR
solution from SpeechWorks and
development tools from vendors
such as Artisoft." (See related
announcement on SpeechWorks'
partnership with Artisoft dated
December 16, 1998.)
SpeechWorks Host supports
speech-enabled applications
requiring just two-to-eight phone
lines and vocabularies of up to
250 words. Developers can easily
deploy applications using Dialogic
standard voice processing boards
under Windows NT(R) on a
Pentium-class PC. Scaling
upward, customers can deploy
SpeechWorks solutions on the
Dialogic Antares platform that
support thousands of telephone
lines and vocabularies of more
than 50,000 words.
So no matter which solution is
used, callers reach a friendly
speech interface instead of
touchtone for information
retrieval, speech-enabled
e-commerce, menu navigation
and telecommunications
applications.
Pricing and Availability
SpeechWorks is available through
Catalyst Telecom and is priced at
$500 to $1,500 per port
depending on the scope of the
application. Dialogic's
SpeechWorks Host is also
available through Catalyst
Telecom and is priced starting at
$200 per port. For sales
information, contact Catalyst
Telecom at 1.800.998.1221.
About Catalyst Telecom
Catalyst Telecom, a division of
ScanSource, Inc, is an
international value-added
distributor of specialty
technologies, including Computer
Telephony, IP Telephony, and
Business Telephone products.
Serving only the value-added
reseller (VAR), developers,
interconnects and integrators,
Catalyst Telecom is committed to
growing specialty technology
markets by strengthening and
enlarging the VAR channel.
Catalyst Telecom's commitment
to VARs includes offering a broad
product selection, competitive
pricing, fast delivery, technical
support, sales training and
customer financing. Catalyst
Telecom is recognized as a
Platinum Distributor for Dialogic
Corporation and a Diamond
Distributor for Lucent
Technologies.
About SpeechWorks
International, Inc.
SpeechWorks enables people to
talk to computers over the
telephone in a natural way. The
company's award-winning
solution, incorporating several
technologies patented by
SpeechWorks, is based on
research conducted at and
licensed by the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
SpeechWorks simplifies and
speeds the development of
speech-activated services for
information delivery and
e-commerce through its
patent-pending DialogModules.
The company also provides
comprehensive system integration
and support services to clients,
and distributes its solution
through an unparalleled network
of resellers and integrators
worldwide. Based in Boston,
Massachusetts, SpeechWorks is a
privately held corporation with
financing from venture capital
firms and Intel Corporation. For
additional information, visit
speechworks.com.
SpeechWorks and DialogModules
are trademarks of SpeechWorks
International, Inc. All other
trademarks are the properties of
their respective owners. On
December 1, 1998, the company
formerly known as Applied
Language Technologies (ALTech)
changed its name to
SpeechWorks International, Inc.
(SpeechWorks).
<<Business Wire, 12-16-98,
14:14 Eastern>>
CONTACT: SpeechWorks | Lauren
Richman, 617.428.4444 |
lauren.richman@speechworks.com
| OR | Schwartz Communications
| Patrick Rafter or Peter Gorman,
781.684.0770 |
prafter@schwartz-pr.com |
pgorman@schwartz-pr.com | OR
| Catalyst Telecom | Bobby
McLain, 864.288.2432
[Copyright 1998, Business Wire] |
