Sensory announced a pair of new speaker verification and identification technologies on Tuesday, allowing users to unlock and personalize devices just through their voice alone.
Sensory, which licenses its intellectual property to chip makers and OEMs, said both technologies can be paired with its TrulyHandsFree voice activation technology. Combining the new technologies will allow OEMs to eliminate the need to manually unlock a smartphone. Instead, users could unlock the phone and begin commanding it by voice alone. They will be demonstrated at the CTIA show next week in New Orleans.
"It sort of defeats the purpose of speech recognition if you have to touch [the phone] first," said Todd Mozer, the chief executive of Sensory, in an interview.
Sensory's speech technology is used in apps like Vlingo, which, in "car mode", constantly cocks a virtual ear, listening for commands. The traditional problem with that approach is that active listening drains CPU cycles and battery power, further limiting the short-lived battery life of today's smartphones.
Mozer explained that the new technologies are embedded below the level of the operating system, via a partnership with embedded chip company Tensilica. They're far enough down that the technology consumes just 5 to 10 milliamps. That's a factor of ten better than the 2010 Vlingo technology, he said.
Speech recognition became a priority, of course, when Apple made its Siri technology the killer app of the iPhone 4S. It's difficult to assess the success of Siri; some Apple fans have bitterly complained about Siri's accuracy, others have bought in to the Apple magic. (Sometimes it helps to talk like a robot.)
Verification, identification, and activation
Sensory's technology has also been used within the Samsung Galaxy S II and Galaxy Note, as well as Bluetooth headsets like the BlueAnt V1. In each, voice commands have been used to activate the device, as well as to issue it commands.
Sensory's new technology provides two new functions, the first of which is identification. Mozer said he sees this as a key differentiator for next-generation living-room devices, which may be shared by several people.
"As an example, when our family watches Netflix, we each want to watch separate things," Mozer said. "Netflix pops up a recommendation for a show designed for 12-year-old girls. The algorithm makes suggestions for you, but it doesn't really work for a family."
A CE manufacturer could use the Sensory identification technology to "know" which user is operating the device, automatically configuring it to his or her preferences. Some products, like Microsoft's Kinect for the Xbox 360, automatically identify the user - in Microsoft's case, visually. Others, like Ford's MyFord technology, can use an identifying code to transfer preferences from vehicle to vehicle.
Verification pulls identification into the security space. That portion of Sensory technology uses two-factor authentication - a code word as well as the user's own voiceprint - to authenticate the user. Mozer said that OEMs will have to decide how sensitive to make the technology; boosting the security settings makes the device more difficult to unlock, but also increases the chance that a noisy environment might interfere with the validation.
And then there's the allergy problem, where a user's voice goes hoarse. In this case, Mozer said, Sensory hasn't performed enough tests. In one instance, however, a remote user speaking on an 8-KHz VOIP call was able to unlock his phone, sitting on a table on the other end of the line, while another person on the call tried and failed to unlock the first user's phone.
Sensory hopes, however, that smartphone OEMs will license both the authentication and TrulyHandsFree technologies, and that CE makers will combine identification and the hands-free tech. All of the new Sensory technologies are currently available for licensing, Sensory said.
So far, Sensory has used "Hello, Blue Genie" as a test phrase. But if an OEM allows it, there would probably be nothing stopping a user from choosing "My voice is my password; verify me" - the famous line from the 1992 classic, Sneakers.
For more from Mark, follow him on Twitter @MarkHachman.
