André JOLY, Author at Turn Voice-AI into actions !

SPIX industry introduces “Voice Experience” to unleash the use of voice in the industry

In today’s digital era, where technology plays a central role in every aspect of our lives, the concept of voice experience is reshaping the industrial landscape. Voice experience refers to the seamless and intuitive interaction between humans and machines through voice commands and responses (also named human-machine smart dialog). This transformative technology is revolutionizing the way we engage with industry processes, equipment, and systems.

In the industrial sector, voice experience is being leveraged to enhance worker productivity, safety, and operational efficiency. Through voice-enabled devices and applications, workers can perform tasks, access information, and control equipment using natural language commands. This hands-free and intuitive approach reduces the need for manual input, streamlines workflows, and minimizes errors.

The integration of voice experience technology in the industry offers numerous advantages. Firstly, it enables workers to access critical information, such as equipment manuals, safety procedures, or inventory data, simply by speaking their queries. This instant and contextual retrieval of information saves time and increases accuracy, empowering workers to make informed decisions on the spot.

Moreover, voice experience promotes worker safety by providing a hands-free environment. In hazardous or high-risk settings, workers can execute commands, report incidents, or request assistance without physical interaction. This not only minimizes distractions but also ensures that workers can maintain focus on their tasks while staying connected to the necessary support systems.

Additionally, voice experience enhances collaboration and communication on the shop floor. Workers can engage in real-time voice conversations with colleagues, supervisors, or remote experts, enabling efficient problem-solving and knowledge sharing. This seamless communication fosters teamwork, accelerates decision-making processes, and ultimately improves overall productivity.

The future of voice experience in the industry holds even more potential. As advancements in natural language processing, machine learning, and artificial intelligence continue to evolve, voice assistants will become even more intelligent and adaptable. They will understand complex commands, learn from user interactions, and offer personalized recommendations, further enhancing the user experience and driving operational excellence.

The limits of the digital transformation

In the wake of the digital transformation of Industry 4.0, industry decision-makers are now able to list the main problem and bottlenecks that are reducing their return on investment and preventing them from achieving their financial goals.

The main problems mentioned by digital managers and plant managers are the following:

The digital transformation of my production plant suffers from resistance from the workers,
The software already deployed (MES, CMMS, FSM) is not used to its full potential,
I don’t get enough data from the field, the data collected from my installations is too weak,
I do not get enough feedback to use the Digital Twin of my factory at the maximum of its capacity,
My workers waste too much time with their business software, interfaces lead to manual interventions and hand-over of data, information is lost or erroneous, non-conformities are the result. Finally, time for value creation is lost.

The introduction of digital solutions on the shop floor not only creates frustrations but may also introduce safety breaches as the workers may lose the focus on their tasks, remove their gloves, and look at a screen instead at their surrounding environment.

The introduction of voice interfaces for field operators is identified as a key solution to solve the problem, generate trust in digital systems, restore safety conditions at work, and generate more digital data from the field. SPIX industry already proved this fact with the development and adoption of its Spix.SKILLS.

SPIX is a voice assistant 100% dedicated to the field and shop floor workers of the industry. This voice assistant closes the gap between the workers (on the right) and their digital tools (on the left). It provides robust to noise voice interactions, natural language dialog functions, and private by design data management. The Spix.SKILLS are embedded, operate offline, and interface with the business software of the industrials.

Voice Experience: for what purpose?

The challenge to solve now is to give the industrials the knowhow and the confidence for them to massively deploy voice technologies on the shop floor. Nevertheless, the deployment of voice-first solutions in the industry requires to resolve a multidimensional system of constraints: coherence of the semantic, performance in the noise, data privacy, user acceptability, audio hardware, utility and usability, and the interface to the already deployed shop-floor software.

To successfully introduce the use of voice on the shop floor, “Voice Experience by SPIX industry” proposes the equivalent of the GAFAM eco-system for voice assistance, but 100% dedicated to the industry.

The “Voice Experience by SPIX industry” focuses on:

Industrial data management: ex. type of data needed to describe the users’ expectations, validation of the privacy of the data,
Assembly and validation of voice interactions: ex. assembly of the Spix.SKILLS, validation under constraints of the expected performances,
Interface to business software: ex. interface protocols generation for business software applications (Apriso, Maximo, SAP, QDA, SiteFlow, …).

The ambition of the “Voice Experience” is to build an eco-system, supported by on-premises solutions, to configure and validate custom voice assistants for the blue collars of the industry.

Thanks to the introduction of Voice Experience and Spix.SKILLS voice interactions on the field the European industry may restore its competitivity with the respective benefits.

Reduction of non-quality

Complex, critical, and rare tasks

Time saving

Access to information, data entry

Better traceability of field operation

Real-time data reports, observations, Retex

Increased safety of people and assets

Reminder of PPEs, alerts, reduction of security breaches

Improved working comfort

Reduce walking, avoid removing PPE, learning HMIs

Conclusion

In conclusion, voice experience is transforming the industry by revolutionizing the way workers interact with machines, systems, and processes. It empowers workers with hands-free, intuitive, and contextually relevant interactions, improving productivity, safety, and collaboration. As the technology continues to advance, embracing voice experience in the industrial setting becomes increasingly crucial for staying competitive and unlocking the full potential of human-machine interactions.

At SPIX industry, we are convinced by the development of intelligent voice assistance solutions in business verticals for the industry. On production, inspection, quality control or maintenance jobs, it is possible to assemble the necessary components of SPIX.SKILLS to ensure the usefulness, usability and acceptability of the voice services rendered to the workers. The development the “Voice Experience by SPIX industry” will help the industrials to satisfying the expected return on investment on their digital transformation.

Talk to an expert

Press contacts
André JOLY – Managing Director
Phone. : +33 (0)6 25 17 27 94
Email: andre.joly@spix-industry.com

Legal entity
Website : spix-industry.com
Linkedin : linkedin.com/company/spix-industry
Simsoft3D SAS – 1244 rue l’Occitane – 31670 Labège (France)
“Voice Experience”, “SPIX” and “SPIX industry” are registered trademarks of Simsoft3D SAS.

SPIX Industry explains how voice assistance will enable companies to grow considerably in the future, with advanced and carefully thought-out technology.

Voice APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) or SDKs (Software Development Kits) have been around for several years (Microsoft Speech, Reco Google, CSDK/VDK, SENSORY, KALDI, ESPNET, and more recently WHISPER from Open AI). These software development tools enable a computer scientist to integrate voice interaction more or less simply into an application or software system and increase the ROI of innovation in the industry.

Not that easy…

Nevertheless, any developer can see the distance that exists between a voice command and a genuine Intelligent Voice Assistance service enabling an operator to run a range/operating procedure, fill in a form, write a report, and run a decision tree, carry out a document search or consult machine data.

More than just an IT tool

For SPIX industry, the development of voice interfaces requires more than just IT: it also requires a close relationship with the business sectors concerned by the voice modality. The greatest successes in deploying voice solutions have been achieved in clearly defined business verticals.

Any UX designer has been able to measure the distance that exists between a simple voice interaction and a Voice Assistant that is acceptable. But also, usable and useful to an operator with his eyes and/or hands focused on his task, in front of a screen or without a screen, whether he is a novice or an expert, a technophile or a technophobe, all immersed in his working environment.

Can be used in all sectors

For SPIX industry, “operator-centric” design is not an empty word. The voice assistance services offered to technical operators must be centred on their business. But also on their needs in terms of digital interaction and of ROI of innovation in the industry

The commercial vagueness currently being skilfully maintained by certain players in the field (everything has become the chatGPT of everything…). The profusion of technical terms being used, shameless and assumed lies (your voice assistant in 30 minutes…). It does not help to see clearly in a field which is nevertheless promising and which should greatly facilitate the digitalisation of workstations in industry.

Offer by SPIX INDUSTRY

SPIX industry’s “Voice Experience” offering is the result of 10 years of research and field trials. It is based on 3 fundamental pillars of the human-system dialogue experience. It proposes a pragmatic and reasonable approach to the introduction of voice modalities in the enterprise:

A complete catalogue

A catalogue of business voice assistance services (SPIX.SKILLs) covering all the activities of an operator in the field. All with a documented API and automated interface capabilities to target applications. SPIX.SKILLs are the business layer that talks to an operator.
For example, the ‘measurement’ SKILL contains all the voice recognition, dialogue and language processing functions needed to help an operator to retrieve a numerical measurement value by voice.

A user’s lab

A User’s Lab based on tools and methodologies to guarantee the adoption of the SPIX Voice Assistant by operators in the field. SPIX.SKILLS speak the language of operators in the field, and the User’s Lab ensures that their expectations and constraints are taken into account.

A performance lab

A Performance Lab based on tools and methodologies to evaluate and optimise the performance of SPIX Voice Support in your operational environment with the appropriate audio equipment. This is the key: a tool is operational if its conditions of use are clearly defined.

Conclusion

Today, the Voice Experience offer aims to bring about in-depth changes in the use of all your company’s business software (ERP/MES, EAM/GMAO, QMS, FSM, WMS, LIMS, etc.).

In the future, the use of voice and voice assistance at all levels of industry will contribute to a complete redefinition of business processes and operations in your company and of the ROI of innovation in the industry

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