The deal enables Virtual World users to have their avatars speak in the voice of their choosing, by typing what they want the avatar to say. Cepstral serves the audio from its hosted (SaaS) platform at VoiceForge.com.
Pittsburgh, PA -- Cepstral LLC announced a strategic partnership
with Anshe Chung Studios Ltd. (ACS), a leading developer and
distributor of virtual goods in 3D online environments. The deal
enables Virtual World users to have their avatars speak in the
voice of their choosing, by typing what they want the avatar to
say. Cepstral serves the audio from its hosted (SaaS) platform at
VoiceForge.com. Currently VoiceFor ge offers the world's largest
catalog of over 50 unique English voices, allowing users to have
their avatar speak with the personality they choose. Voices range
from novelty accents like Evil-Genius, Dallas, Top- Hat, Belle, and
Vixen to classic young adults, American and British.
Initially, ACS will use the technology in the 3D virtual chat
environment IMVU. ACS has sold over 1.2 million pieces of
flash-enabled furniture in use in IMVU, and users of that furniture
will be able access stre aming TTS immediately. Users who have not
purchased furniture from ACS can still demo the VoiceForge TTS
service provided they are in a room with flash-enabled ACS
furniture. This opens up the TTS service to all 20 million current
IMVU users.
"Cepstral's VoiceForge service provides real-time surrogate
voices for users. Their expansive voice variety is consistent with
our mission to provide users with quality digital goods and online
personality. Thei r elegant hosted solution made it a snap to
integrate with our products. In looking for a long-term partner, it
was also important to us that Cepstral owns all their speech
technology and drives innovation in th e speech technology field,"
said Guntram Graef, current CEO of ACS. A demonstration of the
voices can be heard at: http://www.voiceforge.com/demo
"ACS approached us to provide this capability to their users.
They recognize that in a Virtual World, many users don't want to
use their real world voice when chatting. VoiceForge allows the
user to match a voice to their avatar. A proper lady avatar can use
the Southern Belle voice, while a more whimsical avatar might use
the French-Fry voice," said Cepstral CEO Craig Campbell.
"Cepstral's VoiceForge service enhances th e immersive experience
of the Virtual World. ACS is a terrific partner to work with. I'm
delighted to say that Anshe Chung Studios' huge presence in Virtual
Worlds will expose speech technology to a mass audienc e that may
otherwise never have used or considered traditional TTS."
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