SpeechWorks torks ‘Strine

Called Speechify Karen, the TTS engine models voice quality, overall rhythm and intonation to produce a synthetic voice “difficult to distinguish” from genuine Australian speech.

SpeechWorks also released its Canadian French and Americas Spanish version, bringing the languages and dialects supported by Speechify 2.1 to ten, including US English, Continental French, Latin American Spanish, UK English, German, Japanese and Brazilian Portuguese.

Speechify has been selected by Microsoft as the TTS engine for its Microsoft Speech platform. SpeechWorks said the engine, available through its usual outlets, is suitable for a “variety” of network-based applications in the financial services, telecommunications, government, retail, healthcare, travel and hospitality industries.