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Speech recognition the European way: Brussels company tries to redefine the rules of the game
Brussels, Belgium and Excelsior, MN, December 22nd, 2004
SPEECH RECOGNITION WARE announces the launch of Transcription Aid® for Dragon NaturallySpeaking®. The long-promised speech recognition revolution for the average business and public service computer user takes a giant leap forward. This new software significantly increases the already impressive productivity of Dragon NaturallySpeaking®, widely recognized by international experts as the technological as well as market leader in speech recognition. The application brings the correction and editing of text, as well as the transcription from virtually any voice recording application or portable device, to unprecedented levels of simplicity.
Speech recognition is finally coming of age. While millions of medical practitioners and lawyers use it in America, it has not yet made the predicted big breakthrough in the corporate, public administration, and SME sector. Paradoxically, compared to the US, there are only a few hundred thousand users in Europe. Transcription Aid® promises to open these mass markets for Dragon NaturallySpeaking® speech recognition worldwide.
Mark Erwich, International Marketing Director of Nuance, says, "We are very excited that Speech Recognition Ware has used its considerable expertise to build a special application for Dragon NaturallySpeaking® and transcriptionists."
Likewise, Gerard Thompson, President of SRT Distribution in Excelsior, MN, which distributes Transcription Aid® in the US, notes that "No one disputes that one of the most impressive of Dragon's many advanced features is its ability to learn from its recognition mistakes. The problem is that, in the past, the person that dictated the text also had to make the corrections. Now that's changed and it's a whole new ballgame." Other knowledgeable industry insiders are also predicting that Transcription Aid® will be the key that finally opens the normal office environment to the dramatically improved efficiency and cost savings of speech recognition.
In the past, two major hurdles have prevented the widespread adoption of speech recognition in Europe and corporate America. Dragon NaturallySpeaking®, the market leader, and its main competitor, ViaVoice®, are designed in the US. While both feature highly innovative and clever interfaces, the American designers seem to have been unable to figure out how to motivate busy executives to take the time to train the application to their own voice acoustics and unique writing style, as well as to correct recognition errors to improve recognition. Nor did they have a clear idea of the market, social, and consumer constraints at work in Europe.
For example, while the private medical sector has been the most successful speech recognition market in the US, medicine is generally public in Europe. Few European doctors are willing to train their speech recognition systems without compensation by the Social Security services. In addition, European trade unions also tend to regard the technology as a serious job threat to administrative personal such as secretaries and transcriptionists.
| Closing in on perfect speech recognition |
Improvement in speech recognition has indeed been dramatic in recent years. Any user with good dictation habits can get excellent results in both productivity and ease-of-use. An accuracy rate of 97% is possible with little training. However, given the construction of many languages, especially English, some experts assert that 100% accuracy is unachievable, even with a killer app like Dragon NaturallySpeaking®. It still requires the manual and time-consuming correction of each individual misrecognition error. This is essential if the user is to fully exploit the program's remarkable ability to improve its recognition of the speaker's voice and delivery. This is the key to capturing that elusive final 1-3%.
Speech Recognition Ware solved the problem with one of those simple "why didn't I think of that" concepts that everyone "already knows" but somebody else comes up with. They figured out how to make the time-consuming - and therefore often ignored - intelligent correction process much easier and faster. The answer is brilliant in its simplicity: transfer the burden from the user (author of the dictation) to the secretary. SRW recognized early on that the sheer increase in computing power may never lead to perfect recognition. So they concentrated their R&D efforts for the last five years on solving the ergonomics of the correction and learning process of the speech recognition engine.
The result is Transcription Aid®, an incredibly intuitive and easy-to-use interface for third party correction and editing of transcriptions. It can be controlled with equal facility using a standard foot pedal, function keys, or mouse clicks. This leads to immediate and outstanding increases in the productivity and comfort for everyone involved in preparing any type of text. With the addition of Transcription Aid®, users (authors) can reasonably expect to achieve over 99% accuracy in recognition, in very little time and with no extra effort.
| Capitalizing on existing skills |
Additionally, Transcription Aid® makes it possible to delegate the task of improving the Dragon user's speech profiles, without the user even being there. By separating dictation, transcription/correcting, and self-learning, each task is put where individual skills and computing power are maximized.
The secretary simply reads the file transcribed by Dragon NaturallySpeaking® Professional with the Transcription Aid® interface. Whenever an illogical word or phrase due to false recognition occurs, a quick press of the foot pedal, function key, or mouse-click enables the secretary to hear the pronunciation of the person that dictated it in perfect synchronization with the transcription. In this way, the secretary can correct and improve the user's speech profile all at the same time.
| Fundamental improvements for automatic transcription from any digital source |
Every possible advanced feature has been included to enhance productivity. Transcription Aid® not only accepts the transcription generated by someone dictating directly into Dragon NaturallySpeaking®, it also identifies and converts all major sound formats for automatic transcription of voice recordings. It can use digital voice recordings from virtually any application or digital mobile device such as a digital recorder, PDA (Pocket® PC, Sony Clié®, Palm®, MP3 Player with voice recorder, or even Smartphone). A great deal of sophisticated adaptation and synchronization will be required for the built-in NaturallySpeaking® DragonPad to accommodate or match this full range of input devices.
| Increasing the power of NaturallySpeaking® |
Useful built-in macro commands provide easy playback of the voice recording, either entirely or at specific locations (paragraph, line, etc.) with simple mouse clicks or a foot pedal. Playback is both forward and backwards, another welcome addition to DragonPad. Transcription Aid® also resolves some of the critical issues affecting NaturallySpeaking® versions 6 and 7 when dictating directly into Microsoft Word®, the de facto world standard for offices.
Transcription Aid® is the ideal solution for improving productivity within corporations and public administrations. It changes the entire speech recognition equation. Now, Nuance's Dragon NaturallySpeaking® plus Transcription Aid® equals increased accuracy AND increased productivity for everyone. By integrating the job of improving the speaker's speech recognition profile into normal administrative workflow, jobs are protected at the same time productivity is vastly improved. That's a win/win situation by anyone's accounting.
Jesus Maria Boccio, Managing Director of SPEECH RECOGNITION WARE, believes that "Transcription Aid® is so simple to use, it will very quickly conquer the hearts of professionals and secretaries not only in Europe, but everywhere. It has huge potential for increasing productivity in business and public administration. It is the Swiss Army knife for Dragon NaturallySpeaking® and makes the world's best speech recognition engine even better."
SPEECH RECOGNITION WARE is the Premier Applications Solutions Partner of Nuance Inc. for the Dragon NaturallySpeaking® product line in Brussels - the Capital of Europe. SRW has focused on providing world-class integrated speech and dictation solutions, training, and technical support to international organizations and public administrations throughout Europe. It has acquired a unique blend of expertise in speech recognition and digital dictations, as well as perfected adaptations of these systems to the practical needs of users. SRW holds the conceptual, exclusive, and worldwide marketing rights to Transcription Aid®.
In the US, please contact: 1450 Inc., and Eastern Distributing Inc.
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