Nuance Executive Explains Why Smartphones Are Essential To Automobiles

Nuance Communications Inc. NUAN is famous for powering Siri's speech recognition capabilities, which were first introduced by Apple Inc. AAPL in the iPhone 4S. That is only a small portion of Nuance's business, however.

"In terms of designing services for the vehicle, you have to [consider] human lifestyle," Pavan Mathew, senior director of content strategy at Nuance, told Benzinga. "Mobile handsets play a big role. Electronics that are tablets or wearables play a big role. Tying into your home electronics play a big role."

Nuance has also produced a service for Toyota Motor Corp (ADR) TM, Entune and Enform, that is primarily driven by a smartphone.

"Your handset is the processor and your ID," said Mathew. "As you get into the vehicle, it understands [who you are], that's the ID. So we can use that to enrich the experience."

The cloud can be used to authenticate the user's identity.

"That type of activity can happen in the cloud, but the handset -- as you're connected -- you can do all the processing and everything else on the handset, but the feedback happens to be on the screen," Mathew added. "That's an example of how valuable we think the handset is to the experience."

Related Link: How Apple Could Help Tesla By Building A Car

'Deep Integration'

When asked which element is most important for the car, Mathew said that while speech is "fantastic" when "done right," the user experience is "really about deep integration."

"If you look at the design process from computer generations to 3D clay, it is magnificent to beautify a vehicle," said Mathew. "I think that level of attention needs to go into a UX. I think that is probably the most important thing, and then you can bring in the key elements of speech and gestures and haptic. And I think together that's a fantastic experience."

Mathew feels the industry is moving in that direction.

"Really it's about designing in and having a deep integration of the user experience," he concluded. "And that's really where it starts to have that level of attention, talent and resources applied."

Disclosure: At the time of this writing, Louis Bedigian had no position in the equities mentioned in this report.