Nuance confirms its voice technology is behind Apple's Siri
It was long suspected, and now Nuance has confirmed that their technology is indeed present in Siri, the digital assistant available on Apple's iOS devices.

Nuance, a leader in digital speech recognition, has long been thought to have contributed technology to Apple's digital assistant, though neither company had confirmed that until today. Speaking at AllThingsD's D11 conference, Nuance CEO Paul Ricci finally confirmed that Nuance's technology is in fact a part of Apple's Siri.
"We are the fundamental provider of voice recognition for Apple," Ricci admitted when asked whether Nuance was to blame when Siri doesn't understand requests.
Ricci explained that Nuance does not handle Siri's artificial intelligence layers, only the voice recognition. Further, Ricci said that Siri has both embedded and cloud technology for voice recognition, but that the feature is overall a cloud solution.
Ricci went on to note that Nuance doesn't do voice recognition only for Apple. In addition to the company's own Dragon dictation software, Nuance works with Samsung ? presumably on that company's S-Voice Siri competitor ? and other companies to develop voice applications on Android.
Nuance, however, is not involved with Google's speech-recognition effort, Google Now. That feature ? recently brought to iOS and even more recently named in a Siri patent suit ? is thought to have largely derived from Google's own voice recognition efforts and voice services.
Ricci went on to describe the future of voice recognition in technology. The next two years, Ricci says, will see virtual assistants becoming much more robust and working across platforms.
"The real problem," Ricci said, "is creating a virtual assistant that can understand what the user wants and take action based on anticipating those needs."
Apple unveiled Siri with the release of the iPhone 4S, sending many of its competitors scrambling to develop a similar feature. Many of the larger Android manufacturers have done so in the time since, and Google Now has picked up much of the slack for those who haven't.

Nuance, a leader in digital speech recognition, has long been thought to have contributed technology to Apple's digital assistant, though neither company had confirmed that until today. Speaking at AllThingsD's D11 conference, Nuance CEO Paul Ricci finally confirmed that Nuance's technology is in fact a part of Apple's Siri.
"We are the fundamental provider of voice recognition for Apple," Ricci admitted when asked whether Nuance was to blame when Siri doesn't understand requests.
Ricci explained that Nuance does not handle Siri's artificial intelligence layers, only the voice recognition. Further, Ricci said that Siri has both embedded and cloud technology for voice recognition, but that the feature is overall a cloud solution.
Ricci went on to note that Nuance doesn't do voice recognition only for Apple. In addition to the company's own Dragon dictation software, Nuance works with Samsung ? presumably on that company's S-Voice Siri competitor ? and other companies to develop voice applications on Android.
Nuance, however, is not involved with Google's speech-recognition effort, Google Now. That feature ? recently brought to iOS and even more recently named in a Siri patent suit ? is thought to have largely derived from Google's own voice recognition efforts and voice services.
Ricci went on to describe the future of voice recognition in technology. The next two years, Ricci says, will see virtual assistants becoming much more robust and working across platforms.
"The real problem," Ricci said, "is creating a virtual assistant that can understand what the user wants and take action based on anticipating those needs."
Apple unveiled Siri with the release of the iPhone 4S, sending many of its competitors scrambling to develop a similar feature. Many of the larger Android manufacturers have done so in the time since, and Google Now has picked up much of the slack for those who haven't.
Comments
I'm not normally a fan of 'duh' comments, but...
Duh?
Well… yeah?
Buy Nuance.
Buy Liquidmetal Technologies.
Buy Square.
Buy Foursquare.
And let the good times roll.
Apple should consider making some defensive acquisitions in all of their key areas, some as noted by Macvicta above.
Nuance is the largest holder of Voice Recognition IP, over the years they bough most of the competitors. Also Mototorol swipe technology for typing is based on Nuance technology. Yeah apple could have bought them for the IP, but Nuance has licensed most of it IP to everyone, not sure that is something Apple wants to deal with. Most of Nuance revenue comes from their licensing agreements.
When I hear that Apple was being sued over Siri it was kind of interesting since we all believe it was Nuance IP behind most all of it. Not sure how google can get around all the Nuance IP to come up with their own solutions.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MacVicta
Buy Nuance.
Buy Liquidmetal Technologies.
Buy Square.
Buy Foursquare.
All excellent suggestions.
Apple should do this yesterday.
Originally Posted by anantksundaram
All excellent suggestions.
Apple should do this yesterday.
Since they've purchased eight companies since October… and we don't know which they are… maybe they have!
Quote:
Originally Posted by anantksundaram
All excellent suggestions.
Apple should do this yesterday.
Right, because Apple can just up and buy any public company they want. Oh wait...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Applelunatic
Quote:
Originally Posted by anantksundaram
All excellent suggestions.
Apple should do this yesterday.
Right, because Apple can just up and buy any public company they want. Oh wait...
Yep. Current market cap for Nuance NUAN is 6.2 B. For a hostile takeover they would likely need to double that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Since they've purchased eight companies since October… and we don't know which they are… maybe they have!
For their master stroke, they should use $40 billion in cash to short GOOG stock, then perform a leveraged buyout of the company.
It pains me to admit it, but Google's app on iOS is better than voice search on Safari. Apple has tendency to jump out in front and then get complacent, allowing others to quickly build on it's success and surpass them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
For their master stroke, they should use $40 billion in cash to short GOOG stock, then perform a leveraged buyout of the company.
Shorting a stock that has been on a tear all year is probably not the best idea in the world and Apple doesn't do debt so an LBO of anything is pretty unlikely.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mstone
Yep. Current market cap for Nuance NUAN is 6.2 B. For a hostile takeover they would likely need to double that.
That you posted that without laughing at yourself is hilarious. That is not how acquiring another public company works. You don't just go "hurr hurr I buying you!".
Quote:
Originally Posted by Applelunatic
That you posted that without laughing at yourself is hilarious. That is not how acquiring another public company works. You don't just go "hurr hurr I buying you!".
Ok you explain how it's done.
I'm using this info as a working model:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takeover#Hostile_takeovers
Quote:
Originally Posted by Robin Huber
It pains me to admit it, but Google's app on iOS is better than voice search on Safari. Apple has tendency to jump out in front and then get complacent, allowing others to quickly build on it's success and surpass them.
Really?
When did Apple get complacent and as result got behind?
Was this really never confirmed? I feel it was known if not directly stated from either company since Siri used Nuance.
Is this the Nuance speech-to-text part of the system or the Siri-part of the system that can intelligently analyze how to interpret the data after it's been processed past its waveform? In the latter area Google had a huge head start over Apple, and probably even Siri.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mstone
Ok explain how it's done.
The company tenders an offer to purchase all outstanding shares. There is then a vote amongst shareholders to either accept or reject the offer. If a majority agrees then the company is sold.
And for a company such as Nuance which has something like 93% institutional ownership it is highly unlike you're going to be able to buy a majority stake from shares being sold on the market. So your idea of a hostile takeover is mostly a pipe dream. You do realize you can only buy shares of the stock that someone is putting up for sale, right? You don't just say "I'm buying 51% of this company" and poof you own those shares.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Applelunatic
The company tenders an offer to purchase all outstanding shares. There is then a vote amongst shareholders to either accept or reject the offer. If a majority agrees then the company is sold.
And for a company such as Nuance which has something like 93% institutional ownership it is highly unlike you're going to be able to buy a majority stake from shares being sold on the market. So your idea of a hostile takeover is mostly a pipe dream. You do realize you can only buy shares of the stock that someone is putting up for sale, right? You don't just say "I'm buying 51% of this company" and poof you own those shares.
You are describing a tender offer which not really a hostile takeover that I referred to in my original comment. Who knows if Nuance would accept a tender offer but if they would not then the suitor moves on to more hostile techniques of which there are a number of that could be tried.