James Colby, Assistant Vice President of Marketing, Comverse Voice Solutions

Q What does it mean getting awarded the AT&T Wireless account?
A The recent press release from AT&T Wireless signifies the launch of its new voice dialing services. AT&T Wireless is a premier wireless carrier for mobile voice and data services in North America with a reach of more than 20 million subscribers. To be certain, the deployment of voice-activated services in the AT&T Wireless network signifies a major commitment by a tier 1 carrier to offer speech services. In choosing Comverse as its systems vendor, AT&T Wireless recognized our excellence in service, voice user interface (VUI) design and backend systems integration. Comverse has more than 400 wireline and wireless customers worldwide, something not too many other vendors can claim. Our unique value is that we possess the mature processes and procedures required to design, deploy and optimize speech-driven solutions on as little as a hundred telephony ports up to multiple hundreds of ports. Q Please briefly describe the service that AT&T will now be able to offer its customers.
A AT&T Wireless is now offering voice-activated dialing services, branded as #121 Voice Dial, to its entire subscriber base (with the exception of Alaska and Hawaii). To access the service, callers dial #121 and say "Call Jane Smith at work," for example, to be instantly connected with Jane Smith at her business phone. Each subscriber has a personal address book that is kept on the network. The personal address book can store up to 500 contacts with four numbers each (work, home, wireless, extra number) for a total of 2,000 contacts. New entries can be added by voice enrollment or by using a secure Web page provided by AT&T Wireless. Because the address book is kept on the network rather than in the handset, contact information is not lost should the handset be replaced, stolen or misplaced. Q Every time I go into a Mobile Phone retail store I have a hard time finding anyone who can answer any of my questions concerning offerings like speech recognition. How does AT&T Wireless plan on selling these services? Will Comverse assist them in marketing and selling these services?
A To ensure success at every phase of service planning and deployment, Comverse offers the Medalist Marketing Program to all customers deploying enhanced services. The Program includes the following support services: data mining, market analysis and segmentation, pricing and packaging strategies, service promotion, new service launch support, market research, and customer support and training programs. Each Program is tailored to each carrier's specific needs and can help them meet key objectives, which, for example, may range from defining offerings for specific market segments to reducing customer churn to educating call center agents and subscribers. Please visit the AT&T Wireless website at http://www.attws.com/121/ to get more information on AT&T Wireless voice services. Q What will AT&T charge for the services?
A $3.99 per month. Q How long did you all work this project before being chosen as the vendor? Comverse already had a suite of voice-activated products, including voice-activated dialing, prior to being selected as AT&T Wireless' vendor. This product set, combined with Comverse's extensive experience in designing conversational voice user interfaces, were significant factors that resulted in our selection as vendor. Q What makes you think this will be a success?
A Voice-activated dialing is an extension to the portfolio of speech-driven services (#121 Voice Info) already being offered by AT&T Wireless. Moreover, voice-activated dialing is an application that has broad appeal across a large subscriber base. However, in any speech application, it is the user experience that is key. Both Comverse and AT&T Wireless made a significant investment in understanding the needs and requirements. Comverse designed a VUI that would not only meet the business objectives, but also make the application easy to use and understand. In addition, AT&T Wireless is promoting the service at their retail stores and also on their website. Q One of the complaints about using voice recognition services for mobile users is that it is too slow. Have you been able to enhance the quality of the offering for AT&T's customers? If so please describe some of the advancements.
A This really isn't an issue with #121 Voice Dial. First, we've employed an effective VUI design that incorporates a flattened menu structure. Unlike a menu-based VUI that limits functionality and requires users to negotiate excessive steps (e.g., "Call" > Call Whom? > "Jack Smith" > Call Jack Smith Where? > "At Home" > Calling Jack Smith at Home, OK? > "Yes"), a conversational VUI understands everyday language so that users do not need to follow a rigid hierarchy—they simply say what they want, when they want, speeding the time it takes to accomplish tasks (e.g., "Call Jack Smith at home"). Second, we have optimized the grammars, making recognition much quicker. It would be unrealistic to expect that the system could understand any word or phrase a user might say. By employing focus group research, we tune the system so that it recognizes a wide variety of the "right" words, thereby decreasing processing time. Q Why is this server-based system better than an embedded solution that manufactures such as Samsung have recently unveiled for carriers such as Sprint?
A There are several advantages network-based voice dialing has over voice dialing in the handset. First, network-based voice dialing addresses all users now and does not require subscribers to upgrade to a new phone. Second, voice dialing in the network (and its associated technologies) can be readily extended to other new features such as multiparty calling, voice information services and content, and voice-controlled messaging. Third, the speech recognition engine can be evolved and/or upgraded to enable new capabilities and features to be added to the recognizer. In addition, in an open VoiceXML system, the speech recognition engine can perform double duty by supporting not only VAD, but other VoiceXML applications as well, which means that component costs can be leveraged over multiple applications, minimizing costs. Fourth, the address book is kept in the network so contact information is not lost should the telephone be replaced, stolen or misplaced or should the telephone malfunction. In addition, management of the address book is significantly easier with Web-based control of a network-based application. To populate the address book, a subscriber can voice enroll new entries or they can go to a Website offered by the carrier. In most instances, subscribers can download contact information directly from Microsoft Outlook or Lotus Notes, making easy work of managing their address book. Last, the address book can be expanded to include a corporate address book and a system address book. The corporate address book is synchronized with databases managed by the enterprise, so that calling a colleague becomes nearly effortless because all you have to do is say their name into the phone. The system address book is managed by the carrier and includes entries of commonly requested premium access numbers like restaurants, retail outlets, theaters, hotels and more. These frequently used service numbers represent an additional premium revenue source for service providers. Overall, carriers should realize decreased churn because once a subscriber has spent the time to provision the address book, they are more reluctant to switch providers. Q When did AT&T begin offering these services?
A AT&T Wireless launched its Voice Dialing service on November 1, 2002.