Compaq and PureSpeech To Develop Innovative Speech Recognition Program for Personal Computers.

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 20, 1995--Furthering its technology leadership, Compaq Computer Corporation (NYSE: CPQ) today announced that it has made an equity investment in PureSpeech, Inc., formerly Integrated Speech Solutions, a privately-held company that develops advanced speech recognition products. Together they will deliver innovative technology to the computer marketplace. Terms of the investment were not disclosed.

In his keynote address that opened the popular PC Expo trade show, Eckhard Pfeiffer, Compaq President and CEO, said "Together, Compaq and PureSpeech are working on a promising architecture based on neural networks that will result in speaker-independent, continuous speech recognition for personal computers. We expect to implement this technology in many of our systems over the next few years."

"We believe that speech recognition will be a key differentiating feature of personal computers in the future. The PureSpeech technology looks like a major breakthrough in this area and will greatly enhance ease-of-use of personal computers for the home," Pfeiffer added.

"Our goal is to enable Compaq customers to communicate with computers as they communicate most naturally -- through speech," said Ben Chigier, President of PureSpeech. "Most importantly, our systems engage the user in a natural conversation to help them complete their tasks, even though it may not have heard the voice before."

Founded in 1992, PureSpeech, Inc., based in Cambridge, Mass., has emerged as a leader in developing advanced speech recognition technology for both personal computers and the computer telephony market. PureSpeech systems are available for the telephone, microphone and wireless inputs across multiple processing platforms. The company was founded by Ben Chigier, formerly a researcher at Carnegie Mellon University and NYNEX Science and Technology.

Compaq Computer Corporation is the world's largest supplier of personal computers, offering desktop PCs, portable PCs, and servers. Founded in 1982, the Company reported 1994 worldwide sales of $10.9 billion. Compaq products are sold and supported in more than 100 countries through a network of more than 38,000 Compaq marketing partners. Compaq also sells directly to customers through Compaq Direct Plus at 1-800-888-5858. Compaq provides 24-hour customer support and can be reached through the Compaq forums on America Online, CompuServe, Internet (http://www.compaq.com), and Prodigy, or by calling 1-800-345-1518.

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Compaq, Deskpro Registered U.S Patent and Trademark Office. Product names mentioned herein may be trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

CONTACT: Compaq Computer Corp.

Mike Berman, 713/374-0484

or

Miller Communications

Martha Papalia, Jean Borgman, 617/536-0470

or

PureSpeech Inc.

Amy Limb, 617/441-0000