Intel announces voice portal

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by Margret Johnston

ATLANTA (IDG) -- Intel Tuesday announced an integrated hardware and software platform for applications that allows Internet users to obtain information from the Web using regular telephones and voice commands. A company senior executive made the announcement here in a keynote address at the Networld+Interop 2000 trade show.

Taken together, the set of products combine to form a "voice portal" built on Intel components, according to John Miner, vice president and general manager of Intel's Communications Products Group. Aimed at companies who are deploying Internet-based voice applications in their electronic-business infrastructure, the platform is based on Intel servers with Intel DSP (digital signal processing) cards, continuous speech processing, and speech-recognition software.

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Stu Patterson, chief executive officer at speech specialist SpeechWorks International, demonstrated the technology during Miner's keynote by dialing into a server, showing how he could retrieve weather, traffic, sports, entertainment, and stock market information by following the spoken instructions and replying verbally. The platform is already being used by Quack.com and other service providers.

The voice portal has built-in intelligence that recognizes where the caller is and makes assumptions about information the caller might want based on what he or she has already asked for, Patterson said. For example, if a caller asks about the weather in Boston, then asks for movie listings, the system automatically assumes they want movie listings in Boston.

SpeechWorks, which became a publicly traded company in July 2000, believes using speech to access information from the Web will let companies who are developing applications reach a whole new class of users, Patterson said. The company's software, for example, is used by United Airlines passengers, who can call for flight information and report and track lost baggage. It's also behind Federal Express's information services for package arrival information. SpeechWorks has announced an arrangement with Palm that will let users obtain calendar information via voice commands.

Patterson said SpeechWorks supports seven brokerage companies who have integrated speech into their e-business offerings. The company is also working with online map and directions service MapQuest.com, the Weather Channel, and ESPN to provide similar speech-activated information retrieval services.

Some of the largest information technology companies, including America Online Inc. (AOL), Lucent Technologies Inc., Dutch electronics giant Philips NV and IBM Corp. are involved in projects that involve retrieving information from the Internet using speech. AOL recently bought Quack.com and will use its technology to activate a speech portal featuring AOL content, Patterson said. AOL has also invested in SpeechWorks.

Intel's Miner also demonstrated tools designed to simplify Web hosting and e-commerce services. A representative of Verio participated in Miner's keynote, showing how Intel NetStructure products are being used to scale and add new e-business services to company offerings without interrupting their existing computing infrastructure.

Providing the hardware and software solutions for technologies such as voice portals fits into Intel's strategy to be the premier building block supplier for the Internet economy, according to Miner. He said the 35 companies Intel has acquired over the past two years with expertise in telecommunications and data communications, when combined with Intel's expertise in computing, form a powerhouse trio.

"These three ingredients bring the best of computing to the world of networking and the best of networking to the world of computing," Miner said.

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Intel Corp.
Networld+Interop 2000
SpeechWorks International, Inc.

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