Amazon Says 'Ivona' Be Better Than Siri

[Michael Essany]

An announcement eliciting all of our favorite Austin Powers jokes about "Ivona," Amazon said today that it's latest acquisition isn't a laughing matter. And the folks at Apple might agree.

On Thursday, Amazon confirmed that it has acquired leading text-to-speech technology company Ivona Software. Amazon asserts that Ivona delivers world-class technologies that power the "Text-to-Speech," "Voice Guide" and "Explore by Touch" features on Kindle Fire tablets.

It goes without saying that Amazon's move is intended to give Apple's Siri a serious challenge in the increasingly competitive mobile space where Amazon and Apple are already locking horns on a number of different fronts.

Financial terms of the deal weren't revealed, but Ivona, which has been a sophisticated work in progress for more than a decade, is believed to have cost a pretty penny.

"IVONA's exceptional text-to-speech technology leads the industry in natural voice quality, accuracy and ease of use. IVONA is already instrumental in helping us deliver excellent accessibility features on Kindle Fire..." says Dave Limp, Vice President of Amazon Kindle. "The IVONA team shares our passion for innovation and customer obsession, and we look forward to building great products to deliver world-class voice solutions to customers around the world."

Source: Amazon

[zinjen]

Ivana? Ivana Humpalot?

[steve-z17]

Ugh! I do not like that name...a lot funny jokes can be made with that name (see above post)! It just doesn't sound like a great voice to text name.

[Jahooba]

So weird that Amazon (of all companies) is going tit-for-tat with Apple. I remember when Amazon was just a little company down the road in Delaware. I had a lot of friends that worked there. Now that I think about it, I probably should've gotten a job there back when it was convenient!

[monk3y225]

Ivona suck

[Stefman_R]

Just hearing that name makes me think that this will flop. It has no ring to it.

[GenesisDH]

Siri is speech to text and text to speech, so Amazon is still missing a huge piece of that puzzle. Unless, of course, Amazon plans to utilize the talent to produce a two-way system like Siri, Iris, Esri, etc.

[feidhlim1986]

Siri is of zero use to me.
Almost as useless as Apple Maps.

[Greatbiguns]

Ivana? Ivana Humpalot?

"Ivana Humpalot", GOTTA LOVE IT!!

[6309phone]

Why is text -> speech a concern with Siri? We already know it's not good for text to speech.
Siri does speech to TEXT!

[silentassassin12]

Siri is the biggest marketing scam and waste of processing power ive ever seen. It never gets anything right and can never understand what anyone is saying correctly. Somehow the dictation feature on my mac air gets everything i say right but siri cant understand and do simple things.

This sounds just as useless as siri if it doesnt even have voice to txt

[redline11786]

The name isn't really all that easy on the lingo but now that they own Ivona can't they change the name to whatever they want?

[kalpesh78]

Siri is the biggest marketing scam and waste of processing power ive ever seen. It never gets anything right and can never understand what anyone is saying correctly. Somehow the dictation feature on my mac air gets everything i say right but siri cant understand and do simple things.

This sounds just as useless as siri if it doesnt even have voice to txt

You must've got the wrong siri. because i have the right one. Always gets what i tell her.

[Dave_Xiavia]

At this point anything is better than Siri. Apple really messed up w/ that one.

[JohnU]

At this point anything is better than Siri. Apple really messed up w/ that one.

No way iSpeech isn't better than these guys.