South Korea’s Hyundai Motor Group said on Thursday it has jointly developed a conversational voice recognition assistant service with SoundHound Inc., a U.S.-based provider of sound search technology solutions, to mount on vehicles released from 2019.

The joint development with SoundHound, which owns leading-edge technology in voice recognition, artificial intelligence, and music retrieving, is a result of several years of partnership involving technology exchanges since 2012, it said.

The voice recognition assistant service operates on SoundHound’s conversational artificial intelligence platform Houndify. It enables drivers to operate vehicle functions on voice commands. It also provides customized, real-time information to car owners.

Hyundai Motor Group plans to unveil a connected car cockpit applied with the latest technology at Consumer Electronics Show 2018 taking place in Las Vegas in January. The voice recognition system starts operation when a driver says “Hi, Hyundai” in the cockpit.

When a driver makes commands or asks questions, the artificial intelligence server of SoundHound connected to the network recognizes it and delivers related information or vehicle control. The service is also equipped with functions that allow drivers to make phone calls, send and receive messages, identify addresses and songs, receive weather information, manage schedule, and search sports game schedules and results.

By Kim Jung-hwan and Lee Eun-joo

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