International Business Machines Corporation

Jonathan Cook

John Brian Pickering

Brian Hulse

Michael Ken Minakami

A method and system for processing a telephone call in a distributed system comprising a voice response unit and a resource server connected by a local area network; wherein the voice response unit utilizes one or more digital trunks, each of the trunks having a plurality of telephone lines, and wherein the resource server includes a voice recognition system. The method and system comprise demultiplexing an incoming signal, aggregating the incoming telephone signal into a succession of voice data packets, transmitting the packets over the local area network, performing a voice recognition function on the succession of packets, and transmitting the recognized text over the local area network.

Distributed system for call processing

A first computer workstation 10 includes a voice response unit for interfacing to a telephone network. The first computer workstation is attached by a communications link 18 to a second computer workstation 20, which includes a server to perform a particular voice processing function, such as text to speech, voice recognition, FAX-back, and so on. For inbound applications the first computer workstation forwards the incoming signal over the communications link to the server on the second computer workstation for real-time processing, whilst for outbound applications, the reverse process occurs.

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North End Portsmouth, United Kingdom

Jonathan Cook