VOCALIS AND ERICSSON FORM GLOBAL COLLABORATION FOR INTELLIGENT NETWORK SPEECH RECOGNITION SERVICES

Vocalis, the voice technology and call processing specialist, which recently announced its intention to float on the London Stock Exchange, and Ericsson Telecom AB, a world leader in telecommunications, today announce an agreement to create and market voice-activated services for intelligent networks to telephone and cellular network operators worldwide.

The collaboration will provide a total OEM solution that will enable telephone network operators to integrate robust speech recognition technology from Vocalis with Ericsson's Intelligent Network services. As the world's first packaged solution for intelligent, automated operator services, the system will enable network operators to meet fast-growing demand for value-added telephony services.

The combined solution will give telephone network operators the facility to generate revenue through the creation and deployment of new telephone services that can be customised to suit the complex needs of corporate and domestic customers. The user friendly Vocalis speech recognition interface makes it easy for callers to interact with services such as automated transaction processing, automated directory assistance, call completion, voice dialling and voice mail.

Jeremy Peckham, Managing Director of Vocalis, comments, "We are delighted to have formed this collaboration with Ericsson and welcome the new opportunities it will create for us. It also represents a resounding endorsement of our proprietary speech recognition technology. Vocalis has been actively supporting Ericsson in the pursuit of a number of opportunities around the world and we look forward to working together on major OEM applications in the near future." (more)

"Our co-operation with Vocalis will further enhance Ericsson's Intelligent Network system as the most advanced and fully featured of its kind in the world," explains Johan Sandberg, Manager, Interactive Network Services of Ericsson Telecom. "Telephone network operators will benefit from extended user friendliness of their services, increased staff productivity and improved efficiency. These benefits will in turn be fed through to subscribers, so giving the operator a distinct competitive advantage."