Sonos Launches French Voice Assistant Developed by ReadSpeaker Synthetic
Sonos has launched the French-speaking version of its voice assistant with a synthetic voice produced by digital voice interface creator ReadSpeaker. The French Sonos Voice Control came from ReadSpeaker’s VoiceLab custom voice production unit, much like the one in English and Spanish that mimics the voice of Breaking Bad and The Mandalorian Giancarlo Esposito.
Sonos En Français
ReadSpeaker’s synthetic voice is generated from its Deep Neural Networking (DNN) models. French voice talent participated in recording sessions to train the AI. DNN’s precision requirements meant the speakers had to be very constant and precise in their speech, even with the non-standard words and phrases common to music artists, albums, and track titles, which necessitated ongoing work with the Voicelab team. ReadSpeaker’s catalog includes several dozen languages already, most recently Ukrainian,
“We collaborated with ReadSpeaker to create the French voice for Sonos Voice Control. Their expertise in AI-driven text-to-speech and their approach to personalized voice is both innovative and extremely thorough, which is exactly what we needed for this project,” Sonos vice president of voice experience Joseph Dureau said. “The collaboration with ReadSpeaker’s VoiceLab linguistic team has been essential in support for us throughout this project, from the development phase to the launch.”
“We started the project with Sonos about a year ago. They audited the voice technology market and reached out to us because they understood that our VoiceLab unit could really accompany them throughout the custom voice creation,” ReadSpeaker CMO Roy Lindemann told Voicebot in a previous interview. “Either a brand comes to us and wants us to take over and find the voice talent that matches what the brand wants or they already have an idea in mind.”
ReadSpeaker Volume
ReadSpeaker has been expanding its presence in voice AI tools at a steady clip over the last few years in addition to the Sonos arrangement for English, Spanish, and now French. ReadSpeaker offers a real-time text-to-speech plugin for both the Unreal and Unity game engines in February. Game developers can embed a single AI-generated audio setup in a game running on multiple platforms. That followed ReadSpeaker’s unique voice user interface for the Nintendo Switch video game system. That same synthetic voice modeling system is even training pilots to fly the F-35 Lightning II fighter jet. ReadSpeaker also handles Spotify’s interactive voice for the now-discontinued Car Thing automotive audio player.
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