L&H Broadens Consumer Offerings With Speech Interface for Web, Language Learning and Translation Software Products.BURLINGTON, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 27, 1999-- L&H Now You're Talking(TM) On The Web Enables Web Navigation, E-mail and Chat by Voice; New Language Software Provides Learning, Reference and Translation Functionality in Broad Array of Languages Lernout & Hauspie (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on :LHSP LHSP List Hosting Service Provider LHSP Left Handed Starting Pitcher )(EASDAQ See European Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation. :LHSP) (L&H(TM)) today announced the shipment of new consumer products, furthering its strategy to employ speech and language technology in a wide variety of tools that simplify tasks for the average computer user. The new products are L&H Now You're Talking(TM) On The Web, a convenient voice interface for Web browsing, Internet chat, instant messaging Exchanging text messages in real time between two or more people logged into a particular instant messaging (IM) service. Instant messaging is more interactive than e-mail because messages are sent immediately, whereas e-mail messages can be queued up in a mail server for seconds or and e-mail applications; and L&H Simply Translating(TM) Deluxe, a machine translation and language reference tool with support for 35 languages. The company also plans to release shortly L&H Easy Language(TM) 61, the market's only interactive language learning tool with support for 61 languages. These products build on L&H's broad base of consumer market products that employ speech and language technology to improve end user productivity and make everyday tasks easier and more convenient. L&H's three new consumer products are: -0- -- L&H Easy Language 61, estimated street price $49.99 -- L&H Now You're Talking On The Web, estimated street price $49.99 -- L&H Simply Translating Deluxe, estimated street price $69.95 "Speech and language technologies can greatly simplify user interaction with a wide variety of tools and increase productivity for everyday tasks," said Anatoly Tikhman, president of L&H's Speech and Language Applications Division. "The products we're introducing today provide benefits to a wide audience of users, including novices, students, business professionals, homemakers and retirees at affordable prices. These new products can make learning, communicating, and researching much easier for consumers, and more fun." L&H Now You're Talking On The Web - Providing Enhanced Productivity for Web users L&H Now You're Talking On The Web provides comprehensive voice navigation Using voice recognition to select options from a menu. and command and control capabilities for the Web and its services, making it faster and more convenient for users to work with Microsoft(R) Internet Explorer Microsoft's Web browser, which comes with Windows starting with Windows 98. Commonly called "IE," versions for Mac and Unix are also available. Internet Explorer is the most widely used Web browser on the market. It has also been the browser engine in AOL's Internet access software. , AOL (A division of Time Warner, Inc., New York, NY, www.aol.com) The world's largest online information service with access to the Internet, e-mail, chat rooms and a variety of databases and services. Instant messaging, and popular E-mail packages such as Microsoft Outlook For the e-mail and news client bundled with certain versions of Microsoft Windows, see . Microsoft Outlook or Outlook (full name Microsoft Office Outlook . The software supports L&H's Natural Language Technology(TM), allowing users to control e-mail and Web navigation as well as dictate into chat programs and applications -- all in a natural conversational manner. Additionally, the product enables users to easily enter text and numbers into any other desktop applications by speaking in a normal conversational voice. L&H Now You're Talking On The Web also includes L&H's exclusive TalkingTools(TM), a set of voice-powered desktop accessories that include a voice-operated note pad There are several software applications known as Notepad or Note pad.
L&H Now You're Talking On The Web also includes a wide variety of other features that make Web navigation and command and control more intuitive and faster: -0-
-- SayMail provides dictation and Natural Language Technology
commands for the most popular e-mail applications including
Microsoft(R) Outlook(R) and Outlook Express(R), Eudora Pro(R),
AOL mail and more.
-- SayLinks enables users to select Web links just by saying their
labels; move backward and forward through pages without constant
clicking, and enter URLs, search strings and text in a flash -
without typing. SayLinks numbers are displayed next to all links,
giving the user the option to say the name of the link or just
the corresponding number.
-- Chat 2 Chat tightly integrates L&H Now You're Talking On The Web
with popular Internet chat software packages including: Microsoft
chat 2.1 and 2.5, AOL Instant Messenger 2.0 and Yahoo Chat. It
also allows users to dictate directly into Internet chat programs
as fast as they can talk; and automatically convert words and
phrases into their corresponding chat abbreviations.
Pricing and System Requirements To be used efficiently, all computer software needs certain hardware components or other software resources to be present on a computer system. These pre-requisites are known as (computer) system requirements and are often used as a guideline as opposed to an absolute rule. L&H Now You're Talking On The Web has an estimated street price of $49.99. The product will be available in October, 1999 at CompUSA, Staples, Office Depot Office Depot (NYSE: ODP) is one of the world's leading suppliers of office products and services. The Company's selection of brand name office supplies includes business machines, computers, computer software and office furniture, while its business services encompass copying, , Fry's, MicroCenter and other fine retailers. Systems requirements for L&H Now You're Talking On The Web are a Pentium(R) 200MHz (MegaHertZ) One million cycles per second. It is used to measure the transmission speed of electronic devices, including channels, buses and the computer's internal clock. A one-megahertz clock (1 MHz) means some number of bits (16, 32, 64, etc. w/ MMX (MultiMedia EXtensions) A set of 57 additional instructions built into the Pentium MMX chip for improved multimedia and modem performance by performing mathematical operations on multiple sets of data at the same time (see SIMD). (or equivalent); 32 MB RAM ; 200 MB hard disk space; Windows(R) 95/98 or Windows NT (Windows New Technology) A 32-bit operating system from Microsoft for Intel x86 CPUs. NT is the core technology in Windows 2000 and Windows XP (see Windows). Available in separate client and server versions, it includes built-in networking and preemptive multitasking. (R) 4 (service pack 4 or higher); CD-ROM drive A device that holds and reads CD-ROM discs. CD-ROM drives generally also play audio CD discs by sending analog sound to the sound card via a 4-pin cable. For specifications of 10x, 20x, etc. drives, see CD-ROM drives. See CD-ROM, CD-ROM changer, CD-ROM server and CD-ROM audio cable. , Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 or 100% equivalent sound card and a noise cancelling microphone headset (included). No soundcard is required if using a USB USB in full Universal Serial Bus Type of serial bus that allows peripheral devices (disks, modems, printers, digitizers, data gloves, etc.) to be easily connected to a computer. microphone. L&H Easy Language 61 - Makes Language Learning Fun L&H Easy Language 61 is the industry's first software tool that lets business travelers, tourists, students and others quickly and easily learn key words and useful phrases in the broadest array of languages. The software provides language translation, multilingual look-up and phrasebook tools in 61 languages. Each language includes more than 2,100 key words and 360 useful phrases, such as "How much is this?" and "Call a doctor" for a total of 125,000 keywords and 21,000 useful phrases. A proven, fun, interactive learning technique lets users listen to pronunciation by native speakers then record, playback, and rate their own pronunciation using state-of-the-art speech recognition technology and voiceprint A sample of a person's voice to be used for voice recognition or security systems. comparisons. The interactive learning also enables users to play interactive games and test vocabulary skills at the end of each learning session. L&H Easy Language 61 also includes international character sets and phonetic representations to let users learn and see how non-Latin languages, such as Hebrew, Indonesian, Korean, Farsi, Vietnamese, Thai, Yiddish and Japanese, look and sound. Additionally, there are more than 500 useful Internet links, videos and photo tours to help familiarize users with a multitude of cultures. Pricing and System Requirements L&H Easy Language 61 will have an estimated street price of $49.99 with an introductory mail-in rebate of $20.00 available for a limited time. The product will be available in early October 1999 from CompUSA, Office Depot, Fry's, MicroCenter and other fine retailers. L&H Easy Language 61 system requirements include: a Pentium(R) 100 MHz; Windows(R) 95 or 98; 16 MB RAM; 10 MB hard drive space; 2x (or higher) CD-ROM drive; a VGA monitor with 256 colors; a SoundBlaster compatible sound card & speakers; a microphone (optional); a mouse, a modem and a Web browser The program that serves as your front end to the Web on the Internet. In order to view a site, you type its address (URL) into the browser's Location field; for example, www.computerlanguage.com, and the home page of that site is downloaded to you. for Internet features. L&H Simply Translating Deluxe L&H Simply Translating Deluxe provides users with language reference tools for 41 languages, from Arabic to Zulu. It provides English and non-English speaking users an easy way to obtain the language help they need when drafting reports, e-mails or correspondence. The program also translates, based on the context of the sentence, English to and from Spanish, German, French, Italian, Portuguese and Japanese. L&H Simply Translating Deluxe integrates with Microsoft(R) Word and Corel(R) WordPerfect(R) to provide seamless translations that preserve the original formatting. Recommended System Requirements, Pricing and Availability The estimated price of L&H Simply Translating Deluxe is $69.95. Designed for Windows(R) 98, Windows 95 or Windows NT(R) 4.0, the recommended system requirements include a Pentium 100 or higher, 32 MB RAM, 10 MB base install plus 12-35 MB disk space per language pair, a CD-ROM drive, a 16-bit SoundBlaster or compatible sound card and speakers for Text-to-Speech, and Netscape Navigator(R) (version 3.0 or higher) or Microsoft Internet Explorer See Internet Explorer. (version 3.0 or higher) for the L&H Web Translator. L&H Simply Translating Deluxe is expected to be available at CompUSA, MicroCenter, Fry's, and other fine retailers in early October 1999. About Lernout & Hauspie Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) is a global leader in advanced speech and language solutions for vertical markets, computers, automobiles, telecommunications, embedded products, consumer goods consumer goods Any tangible commodity purchased by households to satisfy their wants and needs. Consumer goods may be durable or nondurable. Durable goods (e.g., autos, furniture, and appliances) have a significant life span, often defined as three years or more, and and the Internet. The company is making the speech user interface (SUI Sui (swā), dynasty of China that ruled from 581 to 618. This short-lived dynasty reunified China in 589 after 400 years of division and laid the foundation for further consolidation under the T'ang dynasty. ) the keystone of simple, convenient interaction between humans and technology, and is using advanced translation technology to break down language barriers. The company provides a wide range of offerings, including: customized solutions for corporations; core speech technologies marketed to OEMs; end user and retail applications for continuous speech products in horizontal and vertical markets; and document creation, human and machine translation services, Internet translation offerings, and linguistic tools. L&H's products and services originate in four basic areas: automatic speech recognition (ASR (Automatic Speech Recognition) Using voice recognition to replace keypad entry for telephone voice menus. Typically used to speak the digits 0 through 9 insted of keying them, ASR systems may be able to recognize a limited vocabulary. See voice recognition and AVSR. ), text-to-speech (TTS (1) See text-to-speech. (2) (Transaction Tracking System) Software that monitors a transaction until completion. In the event of a hardware or software failure, it ensures that the database is brought back to its former state before the attempt to ), digital speech and music compression (SMC SMC Saint Mary's College SMC Santa Monica College SMC Solaris Management Console SMC Smooth Muscle Cell SMC Small Magellanic Cloud (also see LMC) SMC Safety Management Certificate (maritime shipping) ) and text-to-text (translation). For more information, please visit Lernout & Hauspie on the World Wide Web at www.lhs.com. This News Release contains forward-looking information that involves risks and uncertainties without limitation but not limited to statements involving L&H's plans, objectives, expectations and intentions regarding the introduction of the L&H Easy Language 61 and Now You're Talking on the Web. Such statements include, without limitation, discussions concerning the company's successful completion of the projects. Readers are cautioned that such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, including, without limitation, the company's reliance on sales by its customers to generate recurring revenues, the early stage of the speech technology market, the management of growth, the successful integration of the company's recent acquisitions, the ability of the company to develop and successfully market new products, rapid technological change and competition. The forward-looking statements contained herein speak only as of the date of this News Release. The company expressly disclaims any obligation or undertaking to release publicly any updates or revisions to any such statement to reflect any change in the company's expectations or any change in events, conditions or circumstance on which any such statement is based. All product names and trademarks mentioned herein are trademarks of L&H or their respective owners. |
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