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Star55 unveils voice recognition system
Tuesday, November 20 2001
by Louise Carroll


A Dublin-based start-up called Star55 Networks has released its first product,
StarTime, which monitors employee timekeeping through voice verification
technology.

 



"StarTime is our first product out to market and we are currently working on
other voice products including one for banking," Gavin McConnon, co-founder of
Star55 Networks told ElectricNews.Net.

 

StarTime is a telephone system that is intended to replace more traditional
timekeeping systems that monitor when employees start and finish work. The idea
is that the employee phones into StarTime from his landline phone at work, which
is identified by the system, the system recognises his voice and it can ensure
that he is at his desk in the office. 

 

The StarTime system is hosted by Eircom in Dublin and runs over its telephone
network. Star55 runs the server and manages the application and database, which
an employer can run a query on to find details of an employee's timekeeping. 

 

The company said that StarTime is ideal for businesses that have a large number
of locations with only a few employees at each branch, such as a video rental
shop. Star55 has not yet announced any customers. 

 

The company licences voice authorisation and voice recognition technology from
Nuance in the US to develop its products and applications. Voice authorisation
technology matches a voice print from a person to identify who the individual is
and voice recognition technology understands the words that are said so it can
perform a user's commands. McConnon said, "Rather than develop software, we
licence it and then we create applications with it. By licensing technologies we
get the updates from the company and we don't have to invest in R&D, and we can
just concentrate on our product."



Although voice authorisation technologies have made progress and are becoming
more secure, they still have problems identifying the difference between
identical twins. A study by the University of Edinburgh found that Nuance's voice
authorisation technology has an error rate of 1.2 percent for an initial sample
of a person's voice reading nineteen words and can be reduced to 0.9 percent with
an additional five words.



Star55 competes with other Irish voice applications companies including Red
Circle and Buytel. But McConnon said that Buytel is focusing more on voice
verification and that Star55 is going to bring out applications that focus more
on the voice recognition.

 

Star55 was founded in April 2000 by McConnon and Paul O'Donnell. O'Donnell was
formerly a business management analyst Hertz Europe and McConnon was working at
telephone services company Promocom. Star55 secured an undisclosed amount of seed
capital from Irish venture capital firm Binary Investments in May 2001. The
company said it is currently putting together a plan for its next funding round.
It employs three people in Dublin.   

 

For more information visit HREF="http://www.star55.com">http://www.star55.com