Audience voice processor based on human hearing system powers NTT DoCoMo’s latest mobile phone
Audience chip supports Sharp’s Triple Kukkiri Talk™ to enable people to hear and be heard everywhere from their cell phones, even in the noisiest places
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – May 12, 2008 – Audience today announced that its industry-first voice processor based on the intelligence of the human hearing system powers NTT DoCoMo’s new mobile phone, Sharp SH705iII, released in April.
The Audience A1010 Voice Processor supports Sharp’s Triple Kukkiri Talk™ by providing the most powerful and robust noise suppression, voice equalizer, and voice stretch performance available today. Whether the noise source is in the caller’s environment, or coming in over the cellular networks from the other end of the call, the Voice Processor instantaneously reduces multiple noise sources, such as airport PA systems, restaurant noise, car noise and street noise. The result for the consumer is clear voice communications over mobile networks in places before unimagined.
The Audience Voice Processor is the first custom IC that is modeled after the most efficient and accurate auditory system, the human hearing system. By understanding the auditory pathway – from the cochlea to the brainstem to the thalamus and cortex – Audience is the first company to deliver a commercial product based on the science of Auditory Scene Analysis (ASA), or the grouping and processing of complex mixtures of sound. Because the Audience Voice Processor handles signals the way people actually perceive specific sounds, it is able to identify and suppress noise sources in an extremely efficient and accurate manner.
“We are proud to announce that Sharp, the number one manufacturer of mobile handsets in Japan, is the first in the world to deliver handsets enabled by the A1010 voice processor,” said Peter Santos, Audience president and CEO. “The latest trends in new mobile technologies often begin in Asian markets, and Japan in particular, with the rest of the world rapidly following. We expect Sharp’s lead in incorporating our processor into its phones to set the trend for mobile handset innovation worldwide and to extend their number one position in Japan.”
About Audience
Audience is a voice processor company that enables clear communications anywhere with noise suppression technology based on the intelligence of the human hearing system. The technology is applicable across a broad range of consumer products where voice needs to be intelligible in noisy environments, and its first commercial product is for the mobile handset market. Audience was selected as the Most Innovative True Mobile Start-Up for the “2008 GSMA Mobile Innovation Global Awards.” The company is one of 34 founding member companies of the Open Handset Alliance and the only one with advanced noise suppression technology. Investors in Audience include Vulcan Capital, NEA, Tallwood Venture Capital and VentureTech Alliance. Audience, www.audience.com, is based in Mountain View, California.
Triple Kukkiri Talk is a registered trademark of Sharp Corporation.