9 December 2009

HUNTSVILLE, Ala., and SAN DIEGO - December 9, 2009 - Asterisk® users looking to add speech recognition can now pay a monthly subscription fee of just $7.99.

The move makes LumenVox's powerful Speech Engine available using the software as a service - or SaaS - model that is becoming increasingly common in the software industry.

"Because we have reduced the cost of entry to an unprecedented low price, anyone who has ever been curious about speech recognition can feel free to give it a try," said LumenVox President Edward Miller.

The $7.99 price provides access to the LumenVox Speech Engine software. The service a subscriber would receive is identical to buying the normal LumenVox Lite license, which allows up to 500 words to be recognized at a time.

There are no contracts or commitments required to subscribe to the service at this price. Users who need more words for larger applications can subscribe to a LumenVox Full license, which allows unlimited words, for $19.99 per month.

Both prices include access to all of the features offered by the LumenVox Speech Engine, as well as support for its six different languages and dialects.

The LumenVox Speech Engine has been available on the Asterisk telephony platform for more than three years, and the SaaS version uses the same Asterisk interface written by Digium.

Miller said the decision to offer the Speech Engine as a subscription service reflects the growing demand for SaaS offerings in the marketplace.

"Particularly during a recession when companies are unwilling to make large capital investments in technology, offering subscriptions makes sense," Miller said. "It allows companies to experiment without commitments, and it's perfect also for users whose speech recognition may vary."

For instance, IVRs that perform outbound political polls see heavy volume immediately before elections that drops off after the election, only to slowly ramp back up. Miller said these sorts of applications would be well served by no commitment subscription licensing.

"Asterisk users are always looking to gain telephony capabilities while reducing costs, so the elimination of up-front costs of the SaaS version of the LumenVox Speech Engine coupled with on-demand increased capacity will catch the attention of many in the community," said Bill Miller, vice president of product management at Digium. "The subscription model makes it easy for Asterisk users to get started and grow."

Users who wish to purchase LumenVox Speech Engine licenses using the traditional method may still do so.

Digium

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