Interactions buys AT&T speech recognition program to improve human-like conversation with automated machines

Interactions, a Franklin, Massachusetts-based firm that provides conversational virtual assistant technology for enterprise-level companies, announced this week it bought the AT&T Watson speech recognition research program, marking its first acquisition.

Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, but Interactions CEO Michael Iacobucci said in an interview that the "sizable" program's scientists are among the most "highly qualified, concentrated groups of speech and natural language technology research scientists in the world."

"This is a group that has for decades developed speech and natural language processing technology," Iacobucci said. "We used them as part of our technology solution, and now we've acquired the group, it's intellectual property, and patents — the whole business unit. We're using that as a way to expose that unique Watson platform to a broader market."

The research program is a division within Dallas-based AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T), and most of the research scientists are based in New Jersey, where they will remain, Iacobucci said.

According to the Watson website, the technology takes inputs in the form of audio files, speech, gestures, face recognition and text, analyzes it, and returns a result, all in real time. Watson is also capable of real-time translation in different languages.

Interactions, founded in 2004 and backed by about $100 million in venture funding, currently employs 1,110 people, with about 200 located in Franklin.

It has about 40, enterprise-level Fortune 1000 clients including Hyatt, Best Western, Humana and TXU Energy. Customer service divisions of these companies use Interactions' high-tech virtual assistant technology that can understand human conversation.