Abstract: An automotive assistant that is connected to microphones and loudspeakers that are associated with different seats in a passenger vehicle includes a dialog manager that is configured to initiate a dialog based on an utterance received at a first one of the microphones and to advance that dialog based on an utterance received from another of the microphones.

Abstract: A vehicle defines an interior space and an exterior space. Within the vehicle are internal microphones that are disposed to capture an acoustic event that originated in an origination space, which is either the interior space or the exterior space. An infotainment system includes circuitry that forms a head unit having an acoustic-signal processor that is configured to receive, from the microphones, a sound vector indicative of the acoustic event and to identify the origination space based at least in part on the sound vector.

Abstract: A hybrid noise-reducer provides an output audio signal by carrying out noise reduction on an input audio signal over a desired range of frequencies. The desired range of frequencies consists of the union of a base range of frequencies and a remainder range of frequencies. The noise reducer includes first and second noise-reduction paths of different types. The first noise-reduction path relies on a dynamic neural network that has been trained using the base range of frequencies. The second noise-reduction path relies on a noise estimation module that uses an estimate of signal-to-noise ratio estimate to identify noise within the remainder range.

Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and other implementations for acoustic interference suppression, including a method that includes obtaining a multi-source sound signal sample combining multiple sound components from a plurality of sound sources in a sound environment, with the plurality of sounds sources including one or more interfering sound sources produced by one or more loudspeakers in the sound environment, determining interfering sound characteristics for one or more sound signals that correspond to the one or more interfering sound sources, and suppressing at least one of the multiple sound components associated with the determined interfering sound characteristics for at least one of the one or more sound signals.

Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and other implementations for noise suppression, including a method that includes obtaining a sound signal sample, determining a noise reduction profile, from a plurality of noise reduction profiles, for processing the obtained sound signal sample, and processing the sound signal sample with a machine learning system to produce a noise suppressed signal. The machine learning system implements (executes) a single machine learning model trained to controllably suppress noise in input sound signals according to the plurality of noise reduction profiles. The processing of the sound signal sample is performed according to the determined noise reduction profile.

Abstract: An In-Car Communication (ICC) system supports the communication paths within a car by receiving the speech signals of a speaking passenger and playing it back for one or more listening passengers. Signal processing tasks are split into a microphone related part and into a loudspeaker related part. A sound processing system suitable for use in a vehicle having multiple acoustic zones includes a plurality of microphone In-Car Communication (Mic-ICC) instances coupled and a plurality of loudspeaker In-Car Communication (Ls-ICC) instances. The system further includes a dynamic audio routing matrix with a controller and coupled to the Mic-ICC instances, a mixer coupled to the plurality of Mic-ICC instances and a distributor coupled to the Ls-ICC instances.

Abstract: A vehicle includes a cabin, an internal-loudspeaker set an external-microphone set, and a signal processor that filters a raw audio signal that has been received by the external-microphone set broadcasts the resulting filtered audio signal into the cabin using the internal-loudspeaker set.

Abstract: Microphone signal is received from at least one microphone. AEC produces an echo cancelled microphone signal using first adaptive filters to estimate and cancel feedback that is a result of the environment. AFC produces a processed microphone signal using second adaptive filters to estimate and cancel feedback resulting from application of the reinforced voice signal within the environment. The uttered speech is reinforced in the processed microphone signal to produce the reinforced voice signal. The reinforced voice signal and the audio signal is applied to the loudspeakers. A step size of adjustment of the second adaptive filters may be increased responsive to detection of reverberation in the microphone signal. The reverberation that is used to control the step size of the second adaptive filters may be added artificially. This may provide multiple benefits including improving adjustment of the second adaptive filters and also improving the sound impression of the voice.

Abstract: An In-Car Communication (ICC) system supports the communication paths within a car by receiving the speech signals of a speaking passenger and playing it back for one or more listening passengers. Signal processing tasks are split into a microphone related part and into a loudspeaker related part. A sound processing system suitable for use in a vehicle having multiple acoustic zones includes a plurality of microphone In-Car Communication (Mic-ICC) instances coupled and a plurality of loudspeaker In-Car Communication (Ls-ICC) instances. The system further includes a dynamic audio routing matrix with a controller and coupled to the Mic-ICC instances, a mixer coupled to the plurality of Mic-ICC instances and a distributor coupled to the Ls-ICC instances.

Abstract: A kitchen machine has an automatic cleaning function. The kitchen machine comprises a vessel, an agitator located in the vessel, a motor configured to rotate the agitator, a heater configured to heat the vessel, a temperature sensor configured to detect a temperature of the vessel, and a controller configured, for cleaning the vessel, to control, based on a temperature detected by the temperature sensor, at least one of a rotation speed of the motor, a rotation duration of the motor, a rotation direction of the motor, a heating temperature of the heater, and a heating duration of the heater.

Abstract: An communication system supports communication paths within an environment by receiving speech signals of a speaker and playing it back for one or more listeners. Signal processing tasks are split into a microphone related part and into a loudspeaker related part. A sound processing system suitable for use in an environment having multiple acoustic zones includes a plurality of microphone communication instances coupled and a plurality of loudspeaker instances.

Abstract: A method detects presence of a multi-tone siren type in an acoustic signal. The multi-tone siren type is associated with one or more siren patterns, where each siren pattern includes a number of time patterns at corresponding frequencies. The method includes processing a number of frequency components of a frequency domain representation of the acoustic signal over time to determine a corresponding plurality of values. That processing includes determining, for each frequency component, a value characterizing a presence of a time pattern associated with at least one siren pattern. The method also includes processing the values according to the siren patterns to determine a detection result indicating whether the multi-tone siren type is present in the acoustic signal.

Abstract: A vehicle defines an interior space and an exterior space. Within the vehicle are internal microphones that are disposed to capture an acoustic event that originated in an origination space, which is either the interior space or the exterior space. An infotainment system includes circuitry that forms a head unit having an acoustic-signal processor that is configured to receive, from the microphones, a sound vector indicative of the acoustic event and to identify the origination space based at least in part on the sound vector.

Abstract: According to some aspects, a system for detecting a designated wake-up word is provided, the system comprising a plurality of microphones to detect acoustic information from a physical space having a plurality of acoustic zones, at least one processor configured to receive a first acoustic signal representing the acoustic information received by the plurality of microphones, process the first acoustic signal to identify content of the first acoustic signal originating from each of the plurality of acoustic zones, provide a plurality of second acoustic signals, each of the plurality of second acoustic signals substantially corresponding to the content identified as originating from a respective one of the plurality of acoustic zones, and performing automatic speech recognition on each of the plurality of second acoustic signals to determine whether the designated wake-up word was spoken.

Abstract: An automotive assistant that is connected to microphones and loudspeakers that are associated with different seats in a passenger vehicle includes a dialog manager that is configured to initiate a dialog based on an utterance received at a first one of the microphones and to advance that dialog based on an utterance received from another of the microphones.

Abstract: There is provided a speech dialog system that includes a first microphone, a second microphone, a processor and a memory. The first microphone captures first audio from a first spatial zone, and produces a first audio signal. The second microphone captures second audio from a second spatial zone, and produces a second audio signal. The processor receives the first audio signal and the second audio signal, and the memory contains instructions that control the processor to perform operations of a speech enhancement module, an automatic speech recognition module, and a speech dialog module that performs a zone-dedicated speech dialog.

Abstract: A low-complexity method and apparatus for detection of voiced speech and pitch estimation is disclosed that is capable of dealing with special constraints given by applications where low latency is required, such as in-car communication (ICC) systems. An example embodiment employs very short frames that may capture only a single excitation impulse of voiced speech in an audio signal. A distance between multiple such impulses, corresponding to a pitch period, may be determined by evaluating phase differences between low-resolution spectra of the very short frames. An example embodiment may perform pitch estimation directly in a frequency domain based on the phase differences and reduce computational complexity by obviating transformation to a time domain to perform the pitch estimation. In an event the phase differences are determined to be substantially linear, an example embodiment enhances voice quality of the voiced speech by applying speech enhancement to the audio signal.

Abstract: A baking attachment for a kitchen appliance has an outer container with inner walls enclosing a receiving compartment and an insertion opening on an upper side. A preparation container is arranged in the receiving compartment. A heating device is provided in an intermediate space between a base and side walls of the preparation container and inner walls of outer container. A mixing and kneading mechanism and a cover for the insertion opening are provided. The outer container detachably inserts into a receiving section of the kitchen appliance base. A free end of a rotary shaft of the mixing and kneading mechanism arranged in a connection section has a first coupling section for rotationally fixed connection to a second coupling section on a drive shaft of the kitchen appliance base. Electrical contact elements of the heating device in the connection section detachable connect to electrical contacts of a kitchen appliance base.