Patents by Inventor Stephan Kanthak

Stephan Kanthak has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 10013652
    Abstract: Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) with many hidden layers and many units per layer are very flexible models with a very large number of parameters. As such, DNNs are challenging to optimize. To achieve real-time computation, embodiments disclosed herein enable fast DNN feature transformation via optimized memory bandwidth utilization. To optimize memory bandwidth utilization, a rate of accessing memory may be reduced based on a batch setting. A memory, corresponding to a selected given output neuron of a current layer of the DNN, may be updated with an incremental output value computed for the selected given output neuron as a function of input values of a selected few non-zero input neurons of a previous layer of the DNN in combination with weights between the selected few non-zero input neurons and the selected given output neuron, wherein a number of the selected few corresponds to the batch setting.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 29, 2015
    Date of Patent: July 3, 2018
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Jan Vlietinck, Stephan Kanthak, Rudi Vuerinckx, Christophe Ris
  • Patent number: 9940927
    Abstract: In some aspects, a method of recognizing speech that comprises natural language and at least one word specified in at least one domain-specific vocabulary is provided. The method comprises performing a first speech processing pass comprising identifying, in the speech, a first portion including the natural language and a second portion including the at least one word specified in the at least one domain-specific vocabulary, and recognizing the first portion including the natural language. The method further comprises performing a second speech processing pass comprising recognizing the second portion including the at least one word specified in the at least one domain-specific vocabulary.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 2013
    Date of Patent: April 10, 2018
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Munir Nikolai Alexander Georges, Stephan Kanthak
  • Patent number: 9837073
    Abstract: Methods of incrementally modifying a word-level finite state transducer (FST) are described for adding and removing sentences. A prefix subset of states and arcs in the FST is determined that matches a prefix portion of the sentence. A suffix subset of states and arcs in the FST is determined that matches a suffix portion of the sentence. A new sentence can then be added to the FST by appending a new sequence of states and arcs to the FST corresponding to a remainder of the sentence between the prefix and suffix. An existing sentence can be removed from the FST by removing any arcs and states between the prefix subset and the suffix subset. The resulting modified FST is locally efficient but does not satisfy global optimization criteria such as minimization.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 21, 2011
    Date of Patent: December 5, 2017
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Stephan Kanthak, Oliver Bender
  • Patent number: 9792910
    Abstract: Computing the feature Maximum Mutual Information (fMMI) method requires multiplication of vectors with a huge matrix. The huge matrix is subdivided into block sub-matrices. The sub-matrices are quantized into different values and compressed by replacing the quantized element values with 1 or 2 bit indices. Fast multiplication with those compressed matrices with far fewer multiply/accumulate operations compared to standard matrix computation is enabled and additionally obviates a de-compression method for decompressing the sub-matrices before use.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 29, 2015
    Date of Patent: October 17, 2017
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Jan Vlietinck, Stephan Kanthak
  • Patent number: 9715874
    Abstract: Techniques are described for updating an automatic speech recognition (ASR) system that, prior to the update, is configured to perform ASR using a first finite-state transducer (FST) comprising a first set of paths representing recognizable speech sequences. A second FST may be accessed, comprising a second set of paths representing speech sequences to be recognized by the updated ASR system. By analyzing the second FST together with the first FST, a patch may be extracted and provided to the ASR system as an update, capable of being applied non-destructively to the first FST at the ASR system to cause the ASR system using the first FST with the patch to recognize speech using the second set of paths from the second FST. In some embodiments, the patch may be configured such that destructively applying the patch to the first FST creates a modified FST that is globally minimized.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 30, 2015
    Date of Patent: July 25, 2017
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Stephan Kanthak, Jan Vlietinck, Johan Vantieghem, Stijn Verschaeren
  • Publication number: 20170125012
    Abstract: Techniques are described for updating an automatic speech recognition (ASR) system that, prior to the update, is configured to perform ASR using a first finite-state transducer (FST) comprising a first set of paths representing recognizable speech sequences. A second FST may be accessed, comprising a second set of paths representing speech sequences to be recognized by the updated ASR system. By analyzing the second FST together with the first FST, a patch may be extracted and provided to the ASR system as an update, capable of being applied non-destructively to the first FST at the ASR system to cause the ASR system using the first FST with the patch to recognize speech using the second set of paths from the second FST. In some embodiments, the patch may be configured such that destructively applying the patch to the first FST creates a modified FST that is globally minimized.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 30, 2015
    Publication date: May 4, 2017
    Applicant: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Stephan Kanthak, Jan Vlietinck, Johan Vantieghem, Stijn Verschaeren
  • Publication number: 20160322059
    Abstract: Computing the feature Maximum Mutual Information (fMMI) method requires multiplication of vectors with a huge matrix. The huge matrix is subdivided into block sub-matrices. The sub-matrices are quantized into different values and compressed by replacing the quantized element values with 1 or 2 bit indices. Fast multiplication with those compressed matrices with far fewer multiply/accumulate operations compared to standard matrix computation is enabled and additionally obviates a de-compression method for decompressing the sub-matrices before use.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 29, 2015
    Publication date: November 3, 2016
    Inventors: Jan Vlietinck, Stephan Kanthak
  • Publication number: 20160322042
    Abstract: Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) with many hidden layers and many units per layer are very flexible models with a very large number of parameters. As such, DNNs are challenging to optimize. To achieve real-time computation, embodiments disclosed herein enable fast DNN feature transformation via optimized memory bandwidth utilization. To optimize memory bandwidth utilization, a rate of accessing memory may be reduced based on a batch setting. A memory, corresponding to a selected given output neuron of a current layer of the DNN, may be updated with an incremental output value computed for the selected given output neuron as a function of input values of a selected few non-zero input neurons of a previous layer of the DNN in combination with weights between the selected few non-zero input neurons and the selected given output neuron, wherein a number of the selected few corresponds to the batch setting.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 29, 2015
    Publication date: November 3, 2016
    Inventors: Jan Vlietinck, Stephan Kanthak, Rudi Vuerinckx, Christophe Ris
  • Patent number: 9323745
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and computer-readable media for performing translations from a source language to a target language. The method comprises receiving a source phrase, generating a target bag of words based on a global lexical selection of words that loosely couples the source words/phrases and target words/phrases, and reconstructing a target phrase or sentence by considering all permutations of words with a conditional probability greater than a threshold.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 21, 2014
    Date of Patent: April 26, 2016
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Srinivas Bangalore, Patrick Haffner, Stephan Kanthak
  • Patent number: 9070368
    Abstract: A system, method and computer readable medium that provides an automated web transcription service is disclosed. The method may include receiving input speech from a user using a communications network, recognizing the received input speech, understanding the recognized speech, transcribing the understood speech to text, storing the transcribed text in a database, receiving a request via a web page to display the transcribed text, retrieving transcribed text from the database, and displaying the transcribed text to the requester using the web page.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 2, 2014
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2015
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Mazin Gilbert, Stephan Kanthak
  • Publication number: 20150058018
    Abstract: In some aspects, a method of recognizing speech that comprises natural language and at least one word specified in at least one domain-specific vocabulary is provided. The method comprises performing a first speech processing pass comprising identifying, in the speech, a first portion including the natural language and a second portion including the at least one word specified in the at least one domain-specific vocabulary, and recognizing the first portion including the natural language. The method further comprises performing a second speech processing pass comprising recognizing the second portion including the at least one word specified in the at least one domain-specific vocabulary.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 23, 2013
    Publication date: February 26, 2015
    Applicant: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Munir Nikolai Alexander Georges, Stephan Kanthak
  • Publication number: 20140330552
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and computer-readable media for performing translations from a source language to a target language. The method comprises receiving a source phrase, generating a target bag of words based on a global lexical selection of words that loosely couples the source words/phrases and target words/phrases, and reconstructing a target phrase or sentence by considering all permutations of words with a conditional probability greater than a threshold.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 21, 2014
    Publication date: November 6, 2014
    Inventors: Srinivas BANGALORE, Patrick HAFFNER, Stephan KANTHAK
  • Publication number: 20140316780
    Abstract: A system, method and computer readable medium that provides an automated web transcription service is disclosed. The method may include receiving input speech from a user using a communications network, recognizing the received input speech, understanding the recognized speech, transcribing the understood speech to text, storing the transcribed text in a database, receiving a request via a web page to display the transcribed text, retrieving transcribed text from the database, and displaying the transcribed text to the requester using the web page.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 2, 2014
    Publication date: October 23, 2014
    Inventors: Mazin GILBERT, Stephan KANTHAK
  • Publication number: 20140229177
    Abstract: Methods of incrementally modifying a word-level finite state transducer (FST) are described for adding and removing sentences. A prefix subset of states and arcs in the FST is determined that matches a prefix portion of the sentence. A suffix subset of states and arcs in the FST is determined that matches a suffix portion of the sentence. A new sentence can then be added to the FST by appending a new sequence of states and arcs to the FST corresponding to a remainder of the sentence between the prefix and suffix. An existing sentence can be removed from the FST by removing any arcs and states between the prefix subset and the suffix subset. The resulting modified FST is locally efficient but does not satisfy global optimization criteria such as minimization.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 21, 2011
    Publication date: August 14, 2014
    Applicant: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Stephan Kanthak, Oliver Bender
  • Patent number: 8788258
    Abstract: Disclosed are systems, methods, and computer-readable media for performing translations from a source language to a target language. The method comprises receiving a source phrase, generating a target bag of words based on a global lexical selection of words that loosely couples the source words/phrases and target words/phrases, and reconstructing a target phrase or sentence by considering all permutations of words with a conditional probability greater than a threshold.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 15, 2007
    Date of Patent: July 22, 2014
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Srinivas Bangalore, Patrick Haffner, Stephan Kanthak
  • Patent number: 8775176
    Abstract: A system, method and computer readable medium that provides an automated web transcription service is disclosed. The method may include receiving input speech from a user using a communications network, recognizing the received input speech, understanding the recognized speech, transcribing the understood speech to text, storing the transcribed text in a database, receiving a request via a web page to display the transcribed text, retrieving transcribed text from the database, and displaying the transcribed text to the requester using the web page.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 26, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 8, 2014
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Mazin Gilbert, Stephan Kanthak
  • Publication number: 20130346086
    Abstract: A system, method and computer readable medium that provides an automated web transcription service is disclosed. The method may include receiving input speech from a user using a communications network, recognizing the received input speech, understanding the recognized speech, transcribing the understood speech to text, storing the transcribed text in a database, receiving a request via a web page to display the transcribed text, retrieving transcribed text from the database, and displaying the transcribed text to the requester using the web page.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 26, 2013
    Publication date: December 26, 2013
    Applicant: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Mazin GILBERT, Stephan KANTHAK
  • Patent number: 8521510
    Abstract: A system, method and computer readable medium that provides an automated web transcription service is disclosed. The method may include receiving input speech from a user using a communications network, recognizing the received input speech, understanding the recognized speech, transcribing the understood speech to text, storing the transcribed text in a database, receiving a request via a web page to display the transcribed text, retrieving transcribed text from the database, and displaying the transcribed text to the requester using the web page.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 31, 2006
    Date of Patent: August 27, 2013
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Mazin Gilbert, Stephan Kanthak
  • Patent number: 7783473
    Abstract: Classification of sequences, such as the translation of natural language sentences, is carried out using an independence assumption. The independence assumption is an assumption that the probability of a correct translation of a source sentence word into a particular target sentence word is independent of the translation of other words in the sentence. Although this assumption is not a correct one, a high level of word translation accuracy is nonetheless achieved. In particular, discriminative training is used to develop models for each target vocabulary word based on a set of features of the corresponding source word in training sentences, with at least one of those features relating to the context of the source word. Each model comprises a weight vector for the corresponding target vocabulary word.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 28, 2006
    Date of Patent: August 24, 2010
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P.
    Inventors: Srinivas Bangalore, Patrick Haffner, Stephan Kanthak
  • Publication number: 20080162117
    Abstract: Classification of sequences, such as the translation of natural language sentences, is carried out using an independence assumption. The independence assumption is an assumption that the probability of a correct translation of a source sentence word into a particular target sentence word is independent of the translation of other words in the sentence. Although this assumption is not a correct one, a high level of word translation accuracy is nonetheless achieved. In particular, discriminative training is used to develop models for each target vocabulary word based on a set of features of the corresponding source word in training sentences, with at least one of those features relating to the context of the source word. Each model comprises a weight vector for the corresponding target vocabulary word.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 28, 2006
    Publication date: July 3, 2008
    Inventors: Srinivas Bangalore, Patrick Haffner, Stephan Kanthak