14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft is putting its money where its mouth is, literally, promising to deliver the power of voice technology to everyday life. In this context, the Redmond Company has announced the acquisition of Tellme Networks, a top provider of voice-based services. According to Microsoft, Tellme shares its vision of information, people and business processes access via speech.
"Speech is universal, simple and holds incredible promise as a key interface for computing," said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer of Microsoft. "Tellme brings to Microsoft the talent, technology and proven experience in speech that will enable us to deliver a new wave of products and revolutionize human-computer interaction."
"We've made great strides in speech technologies, but have only scratched the surface of what is possible," said Jeff Raikes, president of the Microsoft Business Division. "The acquisition of Tellme will bolster Microsoft's existing speech capabilities, bringing both immediate and longer-term value to our customers and partners."
"Tellme was founded with the idea that anyone should be able to simply say what they want and get it from any device, starting with the phone," said Mike McCue, co-founder and CEO of Tellme. "Now, with Microsoft, we'll be able to extend that vision to millions of businesses and consumers around the world."
Tellme is by far the largest hosted voice platform in the world. For Microsoft, the acquisition of Tellme is a step forward towards its software and service business. Via the Tellme platform, users will be able to access various services through speech and nothing else. Microsoft aims to integrate Tellme's hosted voice-enabled customer services solutions in its unified communications offerings.
In addition to unified communications, the Redmond Company also plans to deliver integration with the search platform and mobile services and search. But ultimately, Microsoft will implement hosted voice-enabled customer solutions in Windows Vista, the Microsoft Office System, Windows Mobile, Windows Automotive, as an integer part of the company's greater design for software plus services as opposed to software as service.