Personal Representative System for Autonomous Call Handling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current intelligent agents and voice-activated assistants lack the ability to interact with others on behalf of a user, requiring active user involvement and unable to perform tasks independently.
Innovation Solution
A personal representative system that can automatically answer phone calls, SMS, and messages by using a dialog manager to interpret user queries and respond based on pre-configured knowledge domains, allowing it to perform tasks such as transferring calls, making appointments, and engaging in conversations.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Extent of automation
If a voice-activated assistant is installed on the user's device to respond to queries, then the assistant can perform tasks for the user, but the assistant cannot interact with someone on the user's behalf and requires active user interaction
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an auto attendant system that acts as an intermediary between the user and external callers. The auto attendant receives calls, processes them through DTMF menu systems and IVR, and handles interactions independently without requiring the user to be actively involved. This mediator enables automated user representation while maintaining ease of operation through voice-activated control.
2Adaptability or versatility
If an auto attendant or IVR system is used to answer and transfer calls, then the system can represent an organization, but it cannot perform tasks on behalf of a single user with personal context
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary action by pre-configuring user profiles, contact information, and response templates in the auto attendant system before calls occur. The system stores user-specific data including calendar events, contact lists, and preferred communication patterns. When a call is received, the auto attendant retrieves and applies this pre-configured information to provide personalized responses without requiring complex real-time configuration or user intervention.
3Extent of automation
If a personal representative system automatically answers calls and engages in dialogs, then it can act autonomously on behalf of the user, but the system requires processing speech recognition and dialog management
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the personal representative system into distinct functional modules: speech recognition module for processing audio input, dialog manager for managing conversation flow, call handling module for telephony operations, and user profile manager for accessing stored information. Each module performs a specific function and passes data between them through standardized interfaces. This segmentation enables autonomous call handling while making the complex processing architecture manageable and maintainable.
Data Source
AI summary
A virtual assistant application, system, and service that interacts with a caller over a telephone, cellular, or VoIP network as the called party's representative when the called party is unavailable, providing answers to queries and performing commands that were provisioned by the called party. The application includes a telephony interface, speech recognition and synthesis, a dialog manager, and knowledge domain. The application can also be configured to interact with a sender of SMS, MMS, or IM messages.