Portland, OR, April 17, 2001: SpeechStudio Inc. today began shipping SpeechStudio Suite 1.7, a major upgrade to its complete software development solution for creating voice-driven user interfaces on Microsoft Windows. SpeechStudio Suite enables developers to voice enable new or existing application programs using industry-standard Microsoft Visual Studio C++ and the Microsoft Speech API (SAPI). Included is SpeechRunner, the industry's only comprehensive testing solution for voice-enabled desktop and embedded applications. "SpeechStudio takes advantage of the power of SAPI to make speech development easier," said Xuedong (X.D.) Huang, general manager of Speech Technologies at Microsoft. "With SpeechStudio, application developers can easily design, build, and test integrated speech interfaces using the speech capabilities shipping with new Office XP and Window XP releases."

SpeechStudio Suite 1.7 includes a library of prerecorded speech files for automated testing, one year of technical support, and three software development tools:

• SpeechStudio is a voice interface development tool that enables programmers to describe conversations and their program interactions. The SpeechStudio XML Grammar Editor hides unnecessary complexity and brings intelligent wizardry to the authoring process. SpeechStudio XML grammars extend the power of SAPI 5 with dynamic grammar creation, result parsing, automatic What Can You Say generation, real-time audio recording, and synchronized text-to-speech and audio prompts.
• SpeechRunner delivers a complete testing solution for voice-enabled applications with interactive test development, stand-aside test execution, and automated results analysis. SpeechRunner supports SAPI-compliant voice-recognition engines as well as implementing a simulated voice-recognition engine for highly reliable functional testing.
• SpeechPlayer is a freely redistributable runtime system that coordinates interactions between the voice recognition engine, voice-enabled application programs, and the end user. SpeechPlayer initializes and controls the speech engine while its GUI provides a standard display with hints about what to say, feedback from the voice recognition engine, online help, and a standard interface for short dictation, correction, and system configuration.

"SpeechPlayer is application intelligent, using information embedded by SpeechStudio in the target application to display context-sensitive prompts and focus the voice recognition engine on a precise vocabulary for maximum accuracy," said Dr. Stephen F. Zeigler, President of SpeechStudio Incorporated. "Tests created for SpeechRunner are high level and easily intelligible, maximizing their longevity despite changes to the target application."

Voice-enabled applications can be deployed on any system with Microsoft SAPI 5.0, Microsoft's freely redistributable speech-recognition and text-to-speech software. SAPI 5.0 ships with Office XP and will ship with every copy of Windows XP.

SpeechStudio Suite C++ is available directly from SpeechStudio Incorporated at (800) 574-1103 or via the web at www.programmersparadise.com. A single user license is priced at $1,595. SpeechStudio C++, including SpeechPlayer, is priced at $595.

About SpeechStudio Incorporated

SpeechStudio Incorporated provides software simplifying the integration, refinement, and testing of speech recognition for PC and embedded user interfaces. SpeechStudio software helps our customers to achieve high-quality, reliable, intelligent voice interaction as a strategic asset. SpeechStudio customers add value to their products and maximize their voice capability while minimizing their investments in specific recognition strategies. SpeechStudio Incorporated, founded in 1998, is privately financed.

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