CaTS is pleased to announce that its strategic technology partnership with a renowned wireless application and telephony house has been strengthened with the introduction of text-to-speech (TTS) to an already strong interactive voice response offering.
This allows CaTS's client to host and develop voice applications with dynamic voice being generated and played to the caller on the fly from text.
This addition in terms of technology is especially strategic with regards to applications with very dynamic content, including services like sports updates, weather, traffic, stocks and the like. The first application launched is a traffic information line in co-operation with a local radio station. This service will inform commuters of the latest traffic conditions in the area in which they are travelling.
Johan Grobler, MD of CaTS, stated: "One of the perceived handicaps of IVR was that the content was not as dynamic as most of our clients wanted, and customers want to control their IVR content and to update it randomly and on the fly with no downtime."
This ties in with the bigger strategy of CaTS, by not just supplying technology to organisations for the sake of technology, but making technology part and parcel of the business processes, with extreme focus on return on investment; coupled with the tools to enable the client to leverage current investments going forward. Technology purchased before was also adapted to address the client's needs, now and in future.
Grobler continued: "The solution enables our client to dynamically generate synthesised voice from text, and play it back to the caller. Dynamic text can be added and our client is able to offer various avenues to its clients through which the text can be supplied - be it a Web interface, a text file, etc.
"Hence, for dynamic information, the entry of data and the update of the IVR's content is really an administrative task and not in the developer's domain anymore. I am especially pleased that we could take the previous investment our client made in terms of IVR and leverage that to supply them with a telco grade industrial strength text-to-speech and VoiceXML environment - particularly with the upgrade being virtually seamless," Grobler continued.
There is a whole host of voices on offer and CaTS has compiled a special demonstration package through which its clients can interact with the voices on offer and choose voices in terms of gender, age and accent that suits their environment. Voices can be changed by merely making use of a single element within the VoiceXML language. Furthermore, voices can be tweaked by making use of Synthesized Speed Markup Language (SSML), making it even more natural sounding.
Allied with IBM, a business partner, CaTS is able to leverage voice development which has been done across the globe by IBM and other business partners. Open standards also enable various components, such as the development environment, ports, application server and speech server to integrate without having to be from one specific vendor.
Components can be compiled constituting a bigger solution with a best of breed approach. This was illustrated very graphically by CaTS during recent VoiceXML training, where a convergence of platforms and products was demonstrated to prove the point. Hence, CaTS is positioned to provide a holistic IVR service and adapting to the technology and environment of their clients while having, with 15 years of IVR experience, a large complement of technologies and products it can bring to the table.
Johan Grobler continued: "We are delighted that this technology was a requirement from a client, showing that the market is ready for this paradigm shift in IVR. Also, with so much sales-talk with regards to TTS and VXML, it places us in a very good position to have a working system currently in production and also with the speed with which it was deployed. The intelligibility, natural sound and wide variety of voices on offer are of outstanding quality and again the proof is what is actually working in the marketplace at this present moment."
Grobler concluded: "Our client is placed strategically in terms of voice and has the ability to translate technology into business and service to their valued clients."
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