|
|
Press Release
Nuance Mobile
Tops One Million Transactions;
Sets Goal to be as Pervasive as
Traditional 411, Desktop Search
and Email by End of Decade
Breakthrough
Customer Usage Volume Highlights
Simplicity of Speech Access to
Mobile Content; Usage Frequency
Nearly Doubles in Just 9 Months
LAS VEGAS,
January 10, 2007
– Nuance Communications, Inc.
(NASDAQ: NUAN), a leading supplier
of speech and imaging solutions,
today announced that Nuance
VoiceControl, a mobile search and
messaging service powered by speech
technology, has completed more than
one million speech-enabled mobile
transactions. Users of the Nuance
VoiceControl service can simply
press a single button and speak to
their phone, then instantly receive
desired information or create highly
accurate messages, without any need
for typing on the small, constrained
keypads of mobile devices. Over
the past year, customers using the
service placed “voice requests” on
Sprint-compatible Palm Treo,
Blackberry and Windows Mobile
devices available from Sprint. The
Nuance VoiceControl service was and
is also available via download from
Handango.
Usage analysis of
the most recent mobile transactions
with Nuance VoiceControl reveals
that voice dialing and calendar
access accounted for approximately
65 percent of the speech requests,
while 17 percent of the requests
involved mobile messaging, such as
sending SMS messages or email.
Nearly all of the remaining requests
involved mobile search of yellow
pages directories, news and other
information. Perhaps most
significantly, Nuance reports that
usage frequency of the service
nearly doubled over the last nine
months, with an average of
approximately 30 requests per unique
subscriber in the month of December
2006, compared to 17 voice requests
per user for the month of April
2006.
“Handsets have
incorporated speech applications for
quite some time, but the
functionality was previously limited
to personal information management
(PIM) functionality such as voice
dialing and device control, so much
of the available mobile content
remained deeply hidden behind
confusing menus or awkward and
complicated keypad entry,” said
Michael Thompson, vice president and
general manager, telco, search and
communications, Nuance. “Our
research suggests that by delivering
single-button access to Web content
and messaging, Nuance is helping
mobile users unlock the full
potential of mobile device Web and
data capabilities, thereby creating
significant value opportunities for
users and operators alike. Our goal
is to make mobile search as
pervasive as traditional 411 and
desktop Web search.”
411 Tops Mobile
Search Usage
Reflecting the
growing hunger for mobile
information anytime, anywhere,
approximately 18 percent of all
voice commands in the Nuance study
involved mobile search. This usage
is an indication of rising interest
with end users who appreciate
single-button access to the wealth
of information available on the Web.
According to the results of the
analysis, the most popular
voice-based search category is “Find
Business,” which enables users to
simply ask for any business name or
category, in any city or zip code.
Among all searches, this search
category accounted for over 30
percent of search requests (for
example, “Find Business: Best Buy
store in Las Vegas.”). Web browsing
by voice, where a user requests a
specific Web address, represented 20
percent of voice searches (for
example, “Go to Web site: Nuance.com”),
and general Web search represented
10 percent of all voice searches
(for example, “Web search: how tall
is the Empire State Building?”).
The complete
breakdown of search request
frequency by category includes:
- Business listings
or yellow pages information: 31
percent
- Voice browsing:
20 percent
- Weather: 19
percent
- Web search: 10
percent
- Movies: 6 percent
- Stock Quotes: 6
percent
- Sports: 5 percent
- Top News Stories:
3 percent
Email is Second
Most Popular Feature
Approximately 17
percent of all voice requests were
for creating SMS and email
messages. Email was by far the most
popular messaging method, accounting
for 77 percent of all messaging
requests and 13 percent of voice
requests overall. Email Dictation
was the second most frequently used
feature of Nuance VoiceControl, only
falling behind Voice Dialing. This
feature has been found to be
particularly useful to Blackberry
subscribers, typical heavy users of
mobile email.
Demand for mobile
email is accelerating worldwide with
over 100 percent annual growth for
corporate email users, according to
Portio Research. The ability to
simply dictate an email rather than
type on a small keypad could help
fuel that growth.
The remaining 23
percent of messaging usage in Nuance
VoiceControl was SMS Dictation.
Much like email, users simply push
the button and dictate their short
message (for example, “New SMS to
John Smith; I’m running late, will
be there in 30 minutes”). Portio
Research reports that there were
more than one trillion SMS messages
sent in 2006 worldwide.
Overall Usage
Frequency Nearly Doubled in 9 Months
Each unique Nuance
VoiceControl subscriber used the
service an average of 30 times
during the month of December 2006,
or approximately once per day,
nearly twice the average usage of
16.7 voice requests per month in
April 2006.
“Usage frequency
of our speech-enabled mobile
messaging and mobile search service
has nearly doubled in just nine
months, suggesting that the more
individual users see what’s possible
with tools such as speech-enabled
mobile search, the more they use
it,” said Thompson. “This behavior
reflects the ‘sticky’ nature of the
Nuance VoiceControl service.
Analysis of individual usage
patterns reveals that most users are
initially attracted to the Nuance
VoiceControl service for its voice
dialing and email/SMS dictation
features, and over time discover
other capabilities such as searching
the Web and creating calendar
appointments by voice.”
About Nuance
VoiceControl
Nuance
VoiceControl (formerly
MobileVoiceControl) provides a
speech-enabled service that allows
consumers to press one button on
their mobile phone to easily dictate
and send email or text messages,
dial a contact, create calendar
entries, and search Web content
entirely with their voice. This
complete mobile service with
powerful speech-enabled search and
communications applications is
available today for a $6 monthly fee
for Sprint Nextel subscribers on
select devices and can also be
downloaded from Handango.com. Rich,
dynamic content and advertising is
delivered through a strategic
content relationship with Gannett
Co. Inc. and USA TODAY.
For more
information about Nuance
VoiceControl, please visit
www.nuance.com/mobiledevices.
About Nuance
Communications, Inc.
Nuance is a
leading provider of speech and
imaging solutions for business and
consumers around the world. Its
technologies, applications, and
services make the user experience
more compelling by transforming the
way people interact with information
and how they create, share, and use
documents. Every day, millions of
users and thousands of businesses
experience Nuance’s proven
applications. For more information,
please visit
www.nuance.com.
Nuance and the Nuance logo are
trademarks or registered trademarks
of Nuance Communications, Inc. or
its affiliates in the United States
and/or other countries. All other
trademarks referenced herein are the
property of their respective owners.
|