Nuance, the voice app maker known for creation of the Dragon Naturally Speaking line and Dragon Dictation built into the iPhone, has unveiled its new voice recognition product. Dubbed Nina, the virtual assistant is said to allow developers to quickly upgrade their existing iOS and Android titles with incredible speech-based capabilities.
The technology will reportedly go beyond Siri in combining both voice biometrics and speech recognition in one unified app. And in contrast to Siri, which is currently restricted to Apple’s own iOS platform, Nina will be available to any app maker via an open SDK.
According to Nuance, the software relies on its Text-to-Speech and Natural Language Understanding technologies integrated into a single cloud-based service. In addition to interpreting a user’s speech, Nina is actually capable of identifying who is talking.
The company’s target audience is customer service firms, such as banks and insurance agencies. With Nina, they can greatly improve their apps to enable customers to log in, pay bills, transfer funds, reschedule flights and many more using only their voice. Nuance even promises to create an individual “virtual assistant persona” for each company, tailored to its own specific needs, including the voice implementation and visual representation.
Nina is already up for grabs, with the USAA, a major financial services provider that works with U.S. military and veterans, first on the list. The company is actually expected to launch a pilot later this month. In early 2013, all USAA members will reportedly gain access to the full-fledged version.
As claimed by Nuance, the software is currently available for U.S., U.K. and Australia developers, and more languages are slated to be added later in the year. Those willing to learn additional details on Nona can visit the dedicated page on the company’s website.
