Use Voice to Access Web Email, Calendar, Contacts, and Social Networks During a Phone Call with toktok
Voice-Based Service Helps Users Avoid the Challenges Of Tiny Keyboards and Allows Use of Online Productivity Tools During a Conversation
Mountain View, California, March 2, 2009 - Ditech Networks (NASDAQ: DITC), a global leader in mobile voice processing solutions, announced today that it is developing toktokTM, a new, compelling voice-enabled service to connect people with popular web productivity tools through one word spoken during a phone call. toktok is being designed to easily integrate web applications, social networks, Google calendar and Gmail contacts enabling people to schedule appointments, create new tasks, conference in others, and more – all mid-conversation. The service is being designed to instantly activate when ‘toktok’ is said during a phone call, eliminating the hassle and worry of dropping a call while manually checking availability or fumbling through a contact list.
As people conduct more and more business outside of the office, dependence on mobile devices is significantly increasing. Despite the advances made in wireless technology, certain circumstances, such as driving, severely restrict people from getting the most out of our PDA or cell phone. toktok is being designed to bypass the limitations of mobile keyboards and touch screens, allowing people to perform organizational tasks online using the simplest and most powerful tool available- the human voice.
“Using state of the art word recognition technology, Ditech is redefining what it means to be truly hands-free,” said Dr. Hossein Eslambolchi, former AT&T CTO and technical advisor for Ditech Networks. “With over 15 years of experience improving the voice experience for consumers, Ditech is now utilizing its knowledge to further extend the power of the human voice. This is the beginning of a new era where people can use mobile applications in just about every situation.”
toktok is also being designed to include a Facebook application, ‘Voice Poke’, which will show which members of a person’s online social network are on the phone, and allow ’whisper’ messages to be sent directly into phone calls. These audio messages could be a request to join the conversation, a funny comment, or an important reminder. Future evolutions of the application could include the ability to deliver messages in celebrity voices, short music or movie clips, and more.
toktok is one example of an application that Ditech’s mStage™ platform is being designed to offer to carriers. Announced in February this year at the GSMA’s Mobile World Congress event, mStage is a media platform that is being designed to enable wireless service providers to offer voice access to Web 2.0 applications to their subscribers.
“Our main goal has always been to provide the customer with the best voice experience,” said Todd Simpson, president and CEO for Ditech Networks. “We put the subscribers’ experience first. The toktok features are just the beginning of what Ditech has to offer and we look forward to the endless possibilities that the human voice can enable. With this in mind, toktok will be based on an Open API, enabling the type of innovation we’ve seen on the web to now include voice.”
Ditech will be presenting toktok today at the eComm event at the San Francisco Airport Marriott Hotel in Burlingame, CA. toktok will be available on an invite only basis later this spring. To sign up for an invite please visit www.mytoktok.com .
About Ditech Networks
Ditech Networks is revolutionizing modern communications with advanced voice processing solutions that perform tasks spanning from voice-enabled Web 2.0 and unified communications services to network and speech enhancement. Ditech believes in the power and simplicity of human speech; its technology is being designed to deliver compelling voice capabilities to new communications methods like social networking and text messaging, allowing consumers to use voice in ways that make sense in today’s Web 2.0-savvy world.
Leveraging over 15 years of deployments with communications providers around the world, Ditech offers unique, effective products and services that put the subscriber’s experience first, assisting carriers with revenue generation, service differentiation, network expansion and call capacity. Ditech’s customers include Verizon, Sprint/Nextel, Orascom Telecom, AT&T, China Unicom, Global Crossing and West Corporation. Ditech Networks is headquartered in Mountain View, California. For more information, visit www.ditechnetworks.com.
Forward Looking Statement
This press release contains forward-looking statements regarding Ditech Networks’ expectations of the capabilities of and the benefits from using toktok, and the timing of commercial availability of toktok. Actual performance of toktok could differ materially as a result of unanticipated factors and events, including that toktok is currently in product development, and Ditech could experience unexpected difficulties in the development of toktok. The timing of commercial availability of toktok could be delayed in the event any such unexpected difficulties arise. Further risks inherent in the development by Ditech Networks of new products, such as toktok, are detailed in the "Future Growth and Operating Results Subject to Risk" in Part I, Item 2 of Ditech Networks' Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended October 31, 2008 (filed December 8, 2008, with the Securities and Exchange Commission).
Press Contact: Investor Contact:
Rob Adler Bill Tamblyn
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Ditech Networks, mStage and toktok are trademarks or registered trademarks of Ditech Networks, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective