14 DAY TRIAL // Tellme, Microsoft’s Mountain View, Calif.-based subsidiary, which has been widely known for its speech-recognition business that attracted more than 40 million people, announced recently that it would play an important role in the development of the future Windows Mobile 6.5 platform, which is to be released into the wild this fall.
It seems that Tellme will be highly integrated into the future iteration of Windows Mobile, which means that users will be able to send a text, make a call or search for information though the simple push of a physical button available on their mobile device, given the fact that it will include voice recognition technology. According to the news, the software is already at mobile phone makers, and the first Windows Mobile 6.5-powered handsets will include the feature.
Tellme’s Director of Product Management and Planning Marcello Typrin is reported to have said that the software would also be deeply integrated into the hardware due to a close collaboration with phone makers. In order to activate the feature users will only have to press the Start key on their phones, and it seems that this little piece of hardware will be mandatory on all handsets from now on.
Pressing and holding the key will enable Tellme, and Typrin says that the phones will be easier to use courtesy of the access the application has had to the hardware part. “Putting an application in a menu defeats the purpose,” he said. “It’s not even a downloadable app. We are doing the right thing by shipping in retail out of the box. We’ve been waiting for that opportunity.”
In addition, we might also see the software integrated with Microsoft’s Live search, offering the possibility to search for maps or sports scores, while also allowing users to send texts or call contacts directly through the voice command. Interestingly enough, it seems that Tellme is free to be used with other operating systems as well, though Microsoft owns it.