Kelsey Group Expects Speech Revenues to Reach $2B by 2006

The Kelsey Group is releasing this week its annual "Voice Ecosystem Review and Forecast," in which the firm estimates worldwide revenues from core speech technologies-automated speech recognition (ASR), text-to-speech (TTS), natural language understanding (NLU), embedded speech and attendant infrastructure hardware and software-will grow from $505 million in 2001 to more than $2 billion in 2006.

The firm predicts this growth in core speech technologies will trigger a multiplier effect, driving voice-activated and enhanced telephony services revenues to $27 billion by 2006.

"Early deployments involved 'touch-tone replacement' for information services and high-volume contact centers," explained Daniel Miller, senior vice president of Voice & Wireless Commerce at The Kelsey Group. "New phenomena, like embedding automated speech in handsets, PDAs and cars, will account for significant growth in the coming years. More accurate recognizers, human-sounding text-to-speech, 'open' development tools and 'adaptive' technologies make it possible for the carrier, enterprise and developer communities to introduce new applications quickly and more confidently."

According to the report, after a lackluster 2001, procurement from both enterprise and service provider customers is on the rise.

For this year's report, The Kelsey Group reconfigured its Voice Ecosystem model to support more granular analysis of discrete software, hardware and firmware components, bringing an unparalleled depth of market intelligence to the industry. The model was validated through dozens of interviews with technology providers, system integrators, telecommunications service providers and enterprise decision makers around the world.