During the first few years of speech applications for the call center, we all admired them great...from afar. Few companies (with the exception of large rich organizations like banks and airlines) could afford them, or had the manpower to administer them.

That's why speech solutions have mixed so well with the on-demand delivery model. Costs, complexity and the sheer "fear factor" of speech can be greatly reduced...by keeping the headaches on someone else's doorstep while still being able to reap the benefits.

Speech solutions provider Fluency Voice (www.fluencyvoice.com) announced today that it is experiencing great demand for the hosted (on-demand) version of its speech recognition solution as well as its traditional on- premise version.  During the last three quarters alone, Fluency states that it has seen an 81 percent growth in sales of its Virtual Speech Agent (VSA) Suite solution delivered as an on-demand service compared with the same period in 2006.

Expect to experience more speaking and less button-pushing in the years to come.

TES