Danish Government Receives Award for National Speech Recognition Initiative Powered By Philips SpeechMagic

Speech Technology Magazine

Danish Government Receives Award for National Speech Recognition Initiative Powered By Philips SpeechMagic
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VIENNA, Austria--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 14, 2006--

Royal Philips Electronics (NYSE:PHG) (Amsterdam:PHI) announced today that the government of the Kingdom of Denmark has received the Most Innovative Solution (MIS) Award from Speech Technology Magazine for its implementation of speech technologies. The government has successfully deployed the Philips speech recognition software SpeechMagic as part of a national initiative to improve the accessibility of information to its population, including people with disabilities. The Danish government's initiative comprises three major projects including the live subtitling of TV shows, consumer speech recognition software and speech recognition-based publishing of parliamentary speeches.
"Denmark has a population of 5.4 million people. Thanks to the public-private partnership between the government and companies like Philips, speech recognition software is now available to all Danes. With this unique initiative Denmark is using state-of-the-art technology to give its people access to information and computers without barriers," said Helge Sander, the Danish Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation. The Minister also pointed out that "many other countries with small populations, such as Sweden and Norway, have already expressed interest in following the Danish example."
"The Speech Solutions Awards recognize this year's best in speech technology innovation and implementation," says David Myron, editor-in-chief of Speech Technology Magazine. "Award recipients should be proud to be part of an elite group that is paving the way for others to follow."
By subtitling TV shows the hearing impaired, which total 10 percent of the population, can follow important political events and current affairs programs live on television. In addition, speech recognition software for home PC users will reduce barriers related to the usage of PCs, benefiting elderly people and persons with physical disabilities. The Danish parliament is also planning to use speech recognition in its Official Report publishing system to publish 85% of all reports on the Internet within two or three hours after a speech has been held.
The Danish speech recognition initiative has been realized in a close public-private partnership involving Philips Speech Recognition Systems, Prolog Development Center A/S and Max Manus A/S. The initiative has received DKK 6.000.000 (approx. EUR 780,000) in public funding.