Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

axios.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 418 posts

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#291

Post by atat7024 »

nsriv wrote: post #139
everdrive wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This never seems to be a popular opinion on hn, but this is the ultimate Rube Goldberg machine: A complex ai built by a billion dollar company, an enormous amount of man hours, only so that switching a light switch because slower, and less deterministic. I'm certainly not suggesting that there are no valid uses for ML/AI, but digital assistants seem to be an enormous waste.

I'm a fan of Google Assistant's usefulness and I generally agree with this. The Assistant craze seems more justified when you consider that companies like Google and Amazon are using it as a way to build datasets. It's a strategic reserve of data to build other things from (i.e. Google Duplex) and it doesn't matter at their scale if there isn't a vision yet, if a competitor is stockpiling transcribable voice data, th…

> The Assistant craze seems more justified when you consider that companies like Google and Amazon are using it as a way to build datasets.

Basically every new goddamn trend that is allowed to occur is about how datasets can be compiled from such marketed options.

That's why we don't have first-class convergence devices yet. It'd likely blend our home and mobile usage profiles too much.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#292

Post by bredren »

perardi wrote: post #268
bombcar wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Acquiring is a simple way to show the Board/Shareholders that you're "doing something" - but I suspect it's rarely very successful in the long run. Unless you acquire a business that ACTUALLY provides some synergies you're just on the path of transitioning from a successful company to a poor imitation of Berkshire Hathaway. It does have the advantage that you can "spin off" your acquisitions once they fail to do anyt…

Apple has had some decent ones. P.A. Semi, notably. And for $278 million dollars, the ROI on that was ludicrous. But overall, yes. I can think of so many large-scale acquisitions that didn't go so swimmingly. - AOL/Time-Warner - Ford/its stable of luxury brands like Jaguar and Land Rover - Compaq/HP - Daimler/Chrysler It seems like these “big” mergers tend to now show the synergies people promise. Maybe it’s just too…

Skype’s eventual acquisition by Microsoft is an interesting one.

Can anyone contextualize the horse trading that led to that?

>September 2005, eBay acquired Skype for $2.6 billion.

In September 2009, Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz, and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board announced the acquisition of 65% of Skype for $1.9 billion from eBay.

Microsoft bought Skype in May 2011 for $8.5 billion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#293

Post by RandallBrown »

raobit wrote: post #248
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bear in mind, Nuance is often the voice technology behind other companies' speech-based products too. Nuance technology originally powered Siri, for example.

Is Nuance into healthcare or speech/voice recognition? Didn't knew about the Siri thing though

Yes. My wife uses Dragon for her writing her clinical notes. It's apparently pretty popular.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#294

Post by [deleted] »

fakedang wrote: post #168
FireBeyond wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who was born under the NHS in Scotland, grew up in Australia under its Medicare system (and the introduction of partial privatiz(s)ation), and has lived in the US since 2006, no-one is laboring under that misapprehension. Medicare tax is indeed a line item on Australian taxation paperwork.

I don't know where you get the impression that I'm criticizing the NHS or a nationalized Healthcare service. I'm all for a nationalized healthcare service. My issue is with people who pay nil significant taxes in Europe gloating ignorantly about how European Healthcare is free, and won't stop shitting on American Healthcare. Yeah, your healthcare is cheaper than the US but it isn't free. There is a whole bunch of mid…

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#295

Post by what_ever »

everdrive wrote: post #233
dntrkv wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ignoring the fact that the research isn't only used one for one purpose, a proper assistant is hugely valuable to me. Simple things like: "Remind me to X tomorrow at 9am" "Add Y to the shopping list" "Remind me to do Z when I get home" This is the only way I do reminders now and it's great. It's especially useful while driving, or when I'm in bed nearly asleep and remember something, I can just tell Siri without havi…

I'm still not very impressed by this, as it can be totally accomplished by a pad of paper and a pen. I'm believe the most valid use of AI/ML is to perform tasks that people either cannot currently do, or cannot easily do. For example, ai-based up-scaling of old video game pre-renders. It's not really feasible for a person to do this well, unless you simply rebuild everything with a team of artists. And you could argu…

Let's see the situations when you are setting those reminders -

1. In bed, all ready to fall asleep, you get up to get your notebook from your desk to add the reminder to your notebook.

2. Cooking with hands all messy, you wash your hands, dry them, go to your desk to add the reminder to your notebook.

3. Driving at 40mph, so you pull over in a parking lot, take out your notebook from your bag and add the reminder.

Yeah, I will take telling Google assistant to do this instead.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#296

Post by inopinatus »

fakedang wrote: post #289
vagrantJin wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bruh. You have deep issues. No thinking thinks anything is free. Its free as in I can walk in get treated and walk out without having a cent or anyone asking about my credit details. The difference is in the quality of care as gov run hospitals have much tighter budget constraints and can't treat patients with as much delicacy as private medical institutions.

> You have deep issues Thanks for the personal attacks. Highly appreciated /s > The difference is in the quality of care as gov run hospitals have much tighter budget constraints and can't treat patients with as much delicacy as private medical institutions. Yet somehow places such as Singapore, Thailand and Japan manage to provide top notch healthcare even in government institutions, healthcare that is much better t…

No; everyone knows that goods and services, including those supplied by government, come at an economic cost.

This slur of outright idiocy via economic illiteracy is fiction, and applying slurs to people from a specific region on the basis of their economic circumstances is bigotry 101, so the personal admonishment above is hardly surprising.

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#297

Post by tomcam »

ryanSrich wrote: post #131
tootie wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure Nuance also does the Comcast Xfinity voice remotes. They are actually really well done. And it's a humongous customer to have your claws in.

It’s literally better than Siri. I don’t know how, but it is. I’d say it’s even better than Alexa in terms of its ability to recognize things I say.

I use Siri every day. Former radio guy. Siri is horrible even for me

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#298

Post by mwambua »

$NUAN's spike from $45 on Friday makes sense. However, I'm having trouble figuring out why they currently trade at ~$53 given that the market knows that Microsoft will pay $56 for each share. (https://news.microsoft.com/2021/04/12/microsoft-accelerates-...)

Any ideas on why that is?

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#299

Post by johncoogan »

mwambua wrote: post #298

$NUAN's spike from $45 on Friday makes sense. However, I'm having trouble figuring out why they currently trade at ~$53 given that the market knows that Microsoft will pay $56 for each share. ( https://news.microsoft.com/2021/04/12/microsoft-accelerates-... ) Any ideas on why that is?

Pricing in a small chance that the acquisition won't go through (maybe due to FTC clearance, but could be other due diligence related items).

Re: Microsoft buys Nuance for nearly $20B

#300

Post by [deleted] »

FireBeyond wrote: post #117
ejb999 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>“free healthcare for all” There never has been and will never be 'free healthcare for all' - its not free, it's only free for some people if some other people pay for it.

I'm curious who you think is actually out there laboring under the assumption that healthcare becomes absolutely, and literally, free?

[deleted]
Post reply on HN