Amazon acquires speech recognition startup Yap, prepping Siri competitor?
According to a report from The Atlantic, Amazon might be in the process of readying their own Siri competitor as the company moves to acquire voice-to-text startup Yap. While nothing is official as of yet, the proof comes from an SEC filing that shows Yap has merged with “Dio Acquisition Sub”, a company located in Amazon’s 410 Terry Avenue building in Seattle, Washington.
The voicemail-to-text tech at the heart of Yap’s private beta service (which shutdown as of October 20th) isn’t all that impressive, but the company is said to have a significant amount of intellectual property related to speech recognition. This has lead analysts to speculate the acquisition could be Amazon’s first step into building voice recognition service that could potentially compete with Apple’s Siri voice-control technology.
Of course with the Kindle Fire launch next week, and lack of Siri on iPad, it’s easy to dream up a voice-controlled Amazon tablet experience. Although, it’s likely voice recognition tech makes it’s way to Amazon’s various mobile apps and online experiences as well if the IP acquired from Yap is indeed the start of the company’s venture into voice control.
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