Amazon Echo was launched a year back as a voice enabled device that responds to a variety of user commands and requests. One of Echo's distinguishing features is that it is a far field speech device, i.e. users can talk to it from a distance, hands free, eyes free. We will present some of the key scientific challenges in developing this device and an overview of the research being done at Amazon's Speech group.
Shiv Vitaladevuni is currently a Machine Learning Manager in the Amazon Echo Speech group at Cambridge, MA. He is an alumnus of the dept. and completed his Ph.D in 2007 under Prof. Larry Davis. He previously held Research Scientist positions at Raytheon BBN Technologies and Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He has experience working in many fields that include bioinformatics, computer vision and speech recognition.