Edify Corp. this week is expected to upgrade its speech platform, which combines traditional interactive voice response (IVR) development tools with features supporting VoiceXML, speech recognition and business application integration. The new version, called Edify Voice Interaction Platform 9.0, unbundles Edify’s voice application server and browser to give users more purchasing and deployment options.
“We’ve been known as an all-in-one IVR platform for a long time,” says Marie Jackson, vice president of marketing at Edify, a subsidiary of financial services software maker S1 Corp.
Offering modular components lets users build best-of-breed speech platforms by pairing the Edify pieces they need with other vendors’ tools. “You can use our voice browser with other VoiceXML-compliant applications, for example,” says Ken Waln, Edify’s chief technology officer.
Unbundling its speech platform is a good move for Edify, says Daniel Hong, voice business analyst at Datamonitor. It continues a trend in the industry away from monolithic, proprietary voice platforms toward more modular, standards-based components.
In general, the emergence of standards, such as VoiceXML, is helping to make speech recognition technologies more accessible to a wider range of users. Additionally, the availability of packaged applications that lessen the development load on users is driving adoption of the technology in new markets, Hong says.
“Traditionally only the contact centers with large budgets could afford speech technology, such as those in financial services, telecommunications, and travel and tourism industries. Now with open standards and packaged applications, the price point for speech has dropped, and it’s attracting companies in different markets.”
Some of those new markets include the healthcare, retail and utility industries. For example, utility companies are using automated speech tools to notify customers of outages and service schedules, instead of requiring live agents to handle those calls, says Edify’s Jackson.
Another factor driving investments in voice technologies — including development platforms, speech recognition engines, business applications, and speech services — is call volume. Call center loads aren’t subsiding to the degree some predicted. Rather, the vast majority of customers still use the phone when they want to reach a company, not e-mail or the Web. In the U.S., over 95% of customer interaction in a contact center occurs over the phone, according to Datamonitor.
Voice Interaction Platform 9.0 is due to start shipping at the end of the month. Edify declined to discuss pricing.
