The “Athena” Research & Innovation Center, announces that Innoetics, an “Athena” spin off, has been acquired by Samsung Electronics.
While the purchase price is not disclosed, the Innoetics sale represents a significant exit in the Greek technology sector and the highest valued exit incubated in Greek academic and research centers in recent decades.
Over the last 10 years, Innoetics has developed and distributed award-winning voice technology in the area of Text-to-Speech, which is the counterpart of voice recognition, both essential for the voice-based human-machine interaction lifecycle, especially in view of the rising prevalence of conversational assistants in everyday life. The technology of Innoetics has won prestigious first place “Best TTS” technology awards for several years running.
Moving forward, Innoetics will further develop its ground-breaking software to spread the use of voice-based interaction with ubiquitous, everyday technology. It will operate as an independent, wholly owned subsidiary of Samsung, while remaining in Athens, Greece.
Innoetics was founded in 2006 by five technology visionaries, then working together at the Institute for Language and Speech Processing of the “Athena” Research Center, aiming at the development and most efficient exploitation of their research results in voice technologies. Aimilios Chalamandaris is the CEO of Innoetics.
Innoetics is a Greek technology start up success story. Its acquisition clearly demonstrates how pioneering research can lead to successful innovation and this is a shining example of how a top-notch research group can transform itself into the founding team of a world class technology company.
“We are very proud and excited for this unique success of Innoetics. Visionary basic research by an “Athena” team was the fundamental part of a journey that, propelled by hard and systematic entrepreneurial efforts, led to the creation of a world class voice technology company, worthy of Samsung’s acquisition. “Athena” will build on this experience to promote and support new high-risk out-of-the-box efforts of its researchers, and to augment its capacity to turn research results into efficient technological solutions and new business initiatives”, says Yannis Ioannidis, President and General Director of the “Athena” Research & Innovation Center, and Professor at the Informatics & Telecommunications Department of the University of Athens.
About Innoetics: www.innoetics.com
Innoetics builds leading technology that produces synthetic voices. With unparalleled high-quality synthetic speech that maintains the speech characteristics of the voice talent, Innoetics sets itself apart. Its technology stands out due to its high performance in accuracy, intelligibility, expressivity and naturalness.
About “Athena” RC: www.athenarc.gr
Top-tier research and innovation in Information Technologies lies at the center of the “Athena” Research and Innovation Center mission. As the only Greek Research Center targeting exclusively at these technologies, “Athena” is acting interdisciplinary, working not only on informatics and telecommunications but on the connection of these technologies with all other sciences and human endeavours. Its vision is to have an impact on the world through technological breakthroughs that will address societal challenges, improve industrial practice, inspire creativity, and facilitate the global movement towards smart and sustainable growth for all.
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