Adoption of Voice Technology Crucial to Bridge Digital Divide

Wider adoption of voice technology is critical to bridge the digital divide in India. From integrating voice tech in businesses to improving and enhancing customer experiences, voice technology is becoming a major contributor to bringing digital transformation in the country. A unanimous opinion on these lines was shared by industry stalwarts at a conference titled Voice for Bharat, 2022, organized by Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) today at Sahara Star, Mumbai.

A report titled ‘Evolution of Voice Technology, the Next Revolution in User Interaction’ prepared jointly by IAMAI and PwC was launched at the event. The report traces the journey of voice assistants and how businesses have started to leverage voice technology. It also talks about barriers to voice tech adoption and some key considerations for India in the industry. Talking about the report, Mr. Sumit Srivastav, Partner & Leader - Intelligent Automation, PwC, mentioned how voice tech had the potential to become an enabler to a large workforce which was not very tech savvy. The same was echoed by Sreeraman Thiagarajan, Co-founder & CEO, Agrahyah, who noted that “Anyone who can speak can use voice tech”.

Speaking along the same lines, Gaurav Singh from Verloop, addressed the digital divide that existed when it came to the use of technology among different age groups. He mentioned how use of voice-based search had also enabled the older generation to use smartphones.

Industry stalwarts such as Mr. Sumit Punchhi, CMO, Knowlarity, A Gupshup Company, Mr. Gaurav Singh, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Verloop, Mr. Arnab Mitra, Managing Director, LIQVD ASIA, Mr. Deepak Salvi, Co-founder & COO, Chingari Apps, Mr Vivekanand Pani, Reverie Technologies, Mr. Yatin Naik, Digital and International Radio at Fever FM (HT Media Ltd.), Mr. Arpanarghya Saha, Chief Digital Officer, Nippon India Mutual Fund, Mr. Sathvik Vishwanath, Co-Founder and CEO, Unocoin, Ms. Sonia Parasnis, VP, Creative Strategy & Content Programming, Hungama, Dr. Sanjay Arora, Group Medical Director, Dr Lal PathLabs, and Mr. Pritesh Y. Chothani, Co-founder & CEO, HiVoco Education & Learning addressed various sessions of the conference.

The event witnessed enthusiastic participation by speakers and delegates on several topics such as conversational AI, voice-based customer interaction, bridging the digital divide in India with voice technology, the rise of audio podcasts and other voice based Indian content, to name a few.