News

VoiceXML - wireless theory becomes reality as Orange and Lucent reveal 40 million investment

VoiceXML is "the voice markup language that's driving the voice-enabled internet" - and the second annual VoiceXML Forum, in three weeks, will have a major implementation to celebrate as Orange spends real money on Lucent technology.

Lucent Technologies has announced a €40 million contract from Orange SA "to provide voice-enabled Web access, text-to-speech and other innovative media capabilities" for its next-generation GSM (Global System for Mobile communication) network initiative.

Although this has been greeted as a "wireless Internet" innovation, there's no sign in the agenda for the Forum that it is seen as anything other than an extension of telephony.

The product Orange is buying is the MiLife VoiceXML Gateway. This runs on the Lucent enhanced Media Resource Server (eMRS) - a carrier-grade platform that provides the network resources needed to support text-to-speech and audio playback capabilities. Full details in the Lucent press release.

The Second Annual VoiceXML Forum Users Group Meeting will be a one-day conformance workshop, held in conjunction with the wider three-day AVIOS Speech Expo on Wednesday, May 8th.

The organisers want to invite "individuals and companies who have an interest in VoiceXML technology to gather with VoiceXML industry leaders to share issues, knowledge and information about one of the fastest growing technologies in the telephony business." The event is intended for: "application developers, platform and service vendors, technology consultants and analysts, enterprise IT and call center managers, and executives, is a unique person-to-person educational and networking opportunity."

The agenda will include a full slate of presentations and panel sessions by industry experts and analysts, including an array of VoiceXML Forum members.

Sadly, the really urgent work of harmonising the way voice is handled over wireless networking in Bluetooth and Wifi, with the way it is managed in GSM phone networks, appears to be a project for "another time."