SAN MATEO, Calif., Feb 01, 2006 — VoiceObjects, the leader in Voice Application Management Systems (VAMS), announced today that the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas has chosen VoiceObjects X5, the award-winning VAMS from VoiceObjects, to voice-enable several mission-critical self-service applications. The first, already-implemented application is used by UT Southwestern’s business continuity group as an important part of its comprehensive disaster response program. Applications to be implemented in coming weeks include employee self-service systems and patient billing systems, which will enhance patient and employee satisfaction and provide immediate cost savings. A case study describing the medical center’s success with VoiceObjects X5 is available for download from VoiceObjects’ website, www.voiceobjects.com.
“A software solution built around a voice application server, such as the one in VoiceObjects X5, is critical for the long-term success of a voice-driven self-service application suite like UT Southwestern’s,” said Karl-Heinz Land, President of VoiceObjects. “VoiceObjects X5 will enable UT Southwestern to manage their speech applications with an end-to-end lifecycle management approach, from creation to deployment to analysis to maintenance. I don’t believe any other solution provides that capability.”
UT Southwestern determined that a solution based on VoiceObjects X5 best met its three principal voice technology requirements. First, the solution had to work with the medical center’s existing IVR platform and be compatible with any later-adopted IVR platform. Second, the solution had to be based on the VoiceXML standard. Finally, to ensure long-term cost savings, the medical center’s businesspeople, rather than its computer programmers, had to be able to design, implement and change the applications and their voice interfaces.
“One huge advantage of VoiceObjects X5 is that it enables us to quickly develop prototype applications that we can use to demonstrate the advantages of speech recognition,” said Elwyn Hull, Director of the Office of Telecommunications at UT Southwestern. “In addition, VoiceObjects’ system allows us to rapidly voice-automate applications that may be too small to have previously warranted the time to create them. This allows us to realize the benefits of voice automation at many, many places throughout our organization.”
Other projects slated for development at UT Southwestern are speech-recognition-based surveys, interactive driving directions that will enable patients and visitors to find any location on the medical center’s campus, and an automated continuing education class registration system
