Nuance Dragon NaturallySpeaking Provides Improved Accessibility at Citizens Advice

London, UK, 16 October – Dragon® NaturallySpeaking®, the world’s best-selling desktop speech recognition software from Nuance Communications (NASDAQ: NUAN), is being used by Citizens Advice, a leading national charity, to provide improved accessibility and mitigate the risk of RSI injuries. Citizens Advice is the national charity for the Citizens Advice service which helps people resolve their money, legal and other problems by providing free information and advice, and by influencing policy makers. In this deployment, the procurement of Dragon NaturallySpeaking was managed by Inqology, a Nuance reseller partner.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking turns speech into text at up to 160 words per minute, with up to 99 percent accuracy. The product lets people create documents and email up to three times faster than manual typing, and can be used to surf the web and use PC applications, completely by speaking. By acting as an alternative interface to the PC, Dragon NaturallySpeaking ensures that the charity meets its accessibility obligations. Currently, Dragon NaturallySpeaking is being used within Citizens Advice to create and amend content for AdviserNet, a proprietary web-based legal information resource used by Citizens Advice Bureau advisors. Dragon NaturallySpeaking is also used to update Adviceguide, a popular website that provided independent free advice to over seven million users in 2007-08.

Marcus Adams, Operations Manager at Citizens Advice said: “We are really pleased to have secured Dragon NaturallySpeaking for our staff to help meet our aims of ensuring accessibility for all. Citizens Advice takes the health and safety of its staff very seriously, and it is committed to finding solutions that make their working lives more comfortable.”

Dragon NaturallySpeaking is Section 508 certified to allow hands-free use of the PC for those with disabilities and to assist people with, or at risk of developing carpal tunnel syndrome or other repetitive stress injuries. Dragon NaturallySpeaking has been shown to reduce temporary labour costs and insurance premiums by reducing repetitive stress injuries and worker compensation claims. The enterprise features in Dragon NaturallySpeaking makes deploying it to multiple users in a corporate environment even easier and more cost-effective.

Neil Grant, UK Sales Director for Nuance, said: “Nuance applauds the measures taken by Citizens Advice to both provide better accessibility and mitigate against the risk of developing an RSI-related injury. For years, Dragon NaturallySpeaking has empowered those who don’t like using the keyboard or find it uncomfortable or impractical to do so, while at the same time optimising their productivity.”

Dragon NaturallySpeaking from Nuance is used by millions of people to create documents and emails up to three times faster than typing, and to use their PC simply by speaking. Dragon NaturallySpeaking delivers what matters most in speech recognition – the highest levels of accuracy, seamless integration many popular PC applications, and unrivalled ease of use. Dragon version 10 is available in US English, Australian English, Asian English, Indian English, UK English, Dutch, French, German, Italian and Spanish versions. For more information, please visit www.nuance.co.uk/naturallyspeaking.

About Nuance Communications, Inc:

Nuance (NASDAQ: NUAN) is a leading provider of speech and imaging solutions for businesses and consumers around the world. Its technologies, applications and services make the user experience more compelling by transforming the way people interact with information and how they create, share and use documents. Every day, millions of users and thousands of businesses experience Nuance's proven applications and professional services. For more information, please visit Nuance.co.uk.

About Citizens Advice:

The Citizens Advice service is a network of independent charities that helps people resolve their money, legal and other problems by providing information and advice and by influencing policymakers. The advice provided by the Citizens Advice service is free, independent, confidential, and impartial, and available to everyone regardless of race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, religion, age or nationality. Most Citizens Advice service staff are trained volunteers, working at around 3,300 service outlets across England and Wales.

For more information in England and Wales see www.citizensadvice.org.uk
Advice and information www.adviceguide.org.uk

About Inqology:

Inqology specialise in digital imaging, data capture, and workflows. In the ideal world we would all like a paperless office. In recognition of this, Inqology can enable you to take the pain out of processing paper. We achieve this by devising best fit innovative digital solutions that will increase compliance, productivity and visibility at executive level, on the floor, or out in the field.

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