This week down at CTIA in San Francisco, GotVoice announced partnerships that illustrate an extended presence in the marketplace. Here’s a quick summary of each of the three releases.

1) GOTVOICE AND IVR TECHNOLOGIES PARTNER TO BRING VOICEMAIL UNIFICATION AND TRANSFORMATION-TO-TEXT TO COMMUNICATIONS PROVIDERS (Full Release here)

GotVoice and IVR Technologies, a leading software developer of IP-based enhanced services and real-time billing solutions have partnered to bring voicemail unification and voicemail-to-text solutions to communication providers around the world. The companies’ seamless integration makes it possible for service providers to integrate IVR’s flagship product Talking SIP into GotVoice’s G2 platform, and have Talking SIP’s voicemail messages transcribed into text without requiring a change in carrier or caller behavior.

IVR Technologies’ advanced software platform combines five traditionally separate network elements - application, media, real-time billing, location/registration and Class 5 services - into a single, tightly integrated server for SIP-based voice-over-IP networks. Talking SIP is designed to drive revenue to the network by providing intelligent and in-demand applications that attract users and reduce turnover through innovative features, creative billing options, customizability and end-user empowerment.

IVR Technologies will utilize GotVoice’s next-generation voicemail unification and transformation-to-text platform to unify mobile, home, PBX, VoIP and IP-based PBX voice messages. This enabling customers to read their voicemail and listen to them as digital audio files via email, a mobile phone, or the Web.

2) GOTVOICE TOGETHER WITH VARITALK LIVENS VOICEMAIL WITH CUSTOM VOICE MESSAGES AND VOICEMAIL GREETINGS UTILIZING CELEBRITY VOICES (Full Release Here)

GotVoice has partnered with Varitalk, the world’s leading provider of personalized talking audio, to bring custom voicemail greetings and personalized voicemail messages to customers. We can now silently insert custom messages into people’s voice mailboxes and enrich callers’ existing voicemail experience with custom greetings developed by Varitalk. The partnership makes it possible for consumers to leverage Varitalk’s custom content through GotVoice technology. The service requires no upgrades or changes to existing voicemail systems, and can work across any major provider, including: AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile.

Through this partnership, GotVoice and Varitalk are revolutionizing individualized content for mobile phones, enabling the creation of user-generated voicemail greetings spoken by top celebrities. Through its partnership and integration with GotVoice, Varitalk has been able to extend the reach of its patented technology, creating a new, high-value distribution opportunity for its media and brand clients with user-personalized Voice Mail greetings. Though the application is currently limited to advertiser-paid greetings, Varitalk is exploring a retail offering as well.

3) GOTVOICE ANNOUNCES VOICEMAIL SERVER SUPPORT FOR SERVICE PROVIDERS, VOICEMAIL HARDWARE VENDORS AND IVR COMPANIES (Full Release Here)

GotVoice announced voicemail server support for service providers, voicemail hardware vendors and IVR companies. We can now retrieve voicemail from carriers and PBX installations without the need for upgrades or changes to existing systems for seamless voicemail-to-text and digital audio file integration.

The GotVoice G2 platform already provides unification across multiple existing voicemail platforms, including those from companies such as DCL Metaswitch, Avaya, Octel, Unisys, Nortel, Meridian, HP, Comverse, Cisco, ShoreTel, NEC, InterVoice, OpenWave, Alcatel Lucent and GN Netcom. Network operators utilizing these voicemail platforms can immediately offer their customers a single view and interface that integrates other voicemail platforms – and yet is faster, better quality and offered at a lower price point than is available anywhere else in the world.

The GotVoice solution has already accessed tens of millions of messages pulled from legacy voicemail servers including those of AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile and AllTel. With GotVoice, carriers have an economical and effortless method for delivering their subscribers’ voicemail as both text and digital audio files via email, SMS, Web and API, creating additional revenue streams and increased data traffic. The GotVoice solution is available today to carriers and IP communications providers via OEM, APIs, White Label and Hosted Solutions.

The GotVoice team will be at a number of tradeshows and conventions in September. At each show, we’ll be meeting with bloggers in attendance, or bloggers that happen to live in the area. Send us a quick email if you’d like to be part of the group. We’ll be showing off new demos, have some execs available for 1 on 1 interviews, and likely be accompanied by a few other Seattle tech companies doing the same.

Here’s the schedule:
Sept 10-12: CTIA Wireless IT and Entertainment, Moscone Center, San Francisco, CA
Sept 16-18: Internet Telephony Conference, Los Angeles Convention Center
Sept 22-24: TMIA Fall 2008, Toronto Reniassance

Let us know if you’ll be around any of these shows. We’d love to meet up.

RCR News has an article today featuring GotVoice.  RCR recognizes the pain consumers go through with their Voicemail.

“Voicemail, like caller ID and long-distance calling, has become a standard inclusion in almost all wireless offerings, nearly as much a part of plans as the buckets of minutes themselves. And the phone’s voicemail icon can be an annoyance, reminding users to check their messages the way a spouse might nag them to take out the trash.“

Check out the whole article here.

It’s official.  GotVoice has circled the ring and claimed the title of Best-in-Breed.  Was it our shiny coat?  Our brilliantly white teeth?  Our ability to resist the temptation to inappropriately sniff the competition?  Maybe.

Our development department contends it was because our new G2 platform uses advanced free-form speech recognition technology to provide unmatched voicemail-to-text accuracy and speed and that our new carrier-grade, high quality transcription engine is built for scalability and interoperates with all major voice & VoIP carriers.   That our unique technology pairing allows seamless access to any existing Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and/or voicemail system, as well as voicemail-to-text conversion — without infrastructure upgrades or capital outlays.  Admittedly it’s pretty amazing. 

Still, I chalk up at least part of our victory to the creative use of trimming shears.  Kind of like the creative use of shears by my barber in college.  In fact, his creativity earned me the nickname “Flobie” after the nefarious vacuum haircutting machine of the same.  I know it seemed like a good idea at the time, but looking back on the experience I’d have to say it wasn’t one of my best ideas to choose a barber with an eyepatch. 

If you are going to be at TMIA next week, please feel free to contact GotVoice VP of Marketing Colin Lamont. Colin will be speaking on a panel entitled, “Voice to Text” on Thursday.

If you have ideas for partnerships, co-marketing opportunities or just want to talk about Voicemail tools, Colin will be available most of the week.  Shoot him a quick email from here.

Web Worker Daily does a nice write up of GotVoice this week. The article does an excellent job of explaining some of the difficulties of trying to develop a Voice-to-Text Platform. Rather than just complain about some features that are notoriously hard to accomplish, WWD tells the reader why they are hard, and focuses on the positives. One great line was, “If you get a lot of (voicemail) though, being able to avoid listening to all your messages in linear form saves lots of time.”

Anyway, thanks to the folks over at the Giga Omni Media Team for putting the story together.

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Rich Tehrani does a nice job of covering the Visual Voicemail space this week over at TMC.net. His review is fair across all companies in the space, but his main point is extremely important (though buried at the bottom.)

“Regardless of which service you choose, voicemail to text/visual voicemail is a fantastic productivity booster. I would imagine that students and smartphone users should also want to try the technology out for themselves. It is one of those really fantastic productivity enablers you just don’t expect to be so useful. Once you try one of these services you will wonder how you ever lived without them.”

With Web sites, blogs, podcasts, YouTube and all things digital, it’s easy to forget about those little things called books.

A few months back, a great travel related Web site called JohnnyJet.com listed GotVoice as a top tool for travelers. Here’s a blurb:

“”Now this is a handy one for Travelers. Have your voicemails sent to your e-mail, so if you are overseas you don’t need to make a long-distance call. Or if that someone special left you a message and you want to save it forever.” “

And that listing led to publication on page 211 of Peter Greenberg’s new Travel Detective Bible. If you do a lot of traveling, Peter’s tips and tricks are bound to help.

Christopher Percy Collier at Delta Sky Magazine has a nice little blurb on how GotVoice helps travelers:

When Joel B. Turry’s cell phone is in “roaming” while he travels, sometimes calls go straight to voice mail without his knowing it. “I’m embarrassed to admit that sometimes I would find a new message the following day because I didn’t realize it was there,” says Turry, president of wordZXpressed Transcription Services of Alpharetta, Georgia. No longer. With Got Voice (gotvoice.com), a new service that aggregates multiple communications into a single place, he’s always in the loop. Through the Web site (or via e-mail), he gets notification of all calls coming to his cell phone and his office phone, along with an audio file of the recorded message. “I can usually see who called, and then—boom!—play it back, and even forward it on by e-mail to my colleagues,” says Turry. “It’s like having an electric string tied to my wrist.”

Thanks Christopher for the mention, and we’re glad you like the service, Joel.

We want to thank Paul Gilster for nice coverage in the NewsObserver. Paul lists GotVoice along with Jott and Pinger as helpful alternatives to traditional voicemail. One quick line:

“And here’s something I like. GotVoice’s visual voice mail feature is tailored to mobile phones. All of your voice mail can be monitored and read, and, if your phone can play MP3 files, it can play the original audio as well.”