BlueAnt rolls out S4 Bluetooth car speakerphone

BlueAnt has just introduced its latest device known as the S4, where this is touted to be the first true hands-free voice controlled Bluetooth car speakerphone. What does this mean for the driver? Well, for the first time, drivers are able to communicate on the road without having to touch either their phone or car speakerphone – now how about that? All you need to do is speak to the BlueAnt S4 if you want to make or receive calls, or even access information on the phone itself. Before starting, clear your throat and say the hands-free trigger phrase “BlueAnt Speak To Me” at any time, and watch the S4 more than ready and willing to serve you at every beck and call. Following that, say the command to activate your phone’s voice dialing feature, and you can make a call by mentioning the person’s name. Works great if you are familiar with your very own naming convention on the phone, but we’re not too sure how many of us out there are able to remember every single name keyed in. What happens when there are multiple same names but different people? Apart from that, whenever there is an incoming call, the S4 will read out the caller’s name and ask you whether to proceed with answering the call or not. Text to speech (TTS) technology is utilized and will b able to transfer and store up to 2,000 phonebook entries from each paired mobile phone.

In an effort to reduce distracted driving, BlueAnt and Vlingo have teamed up in order to offer drivers a safer, easier way to consume SMS messages and email by including the SafeReader application on the S4 which will play nice with both BlackBerry smartphones and Android 2.0+ devices. The latter currently comprises of just a handful of phones, so early Android devices that are stuck at Android 1.6 might want to reconsider getting the S4. You will need to press a button this time round though, as doing so followed by saying “Start SafeReader”, the feature will be activated so all incoming messages will be delivered audibly through the S4.

Not only that, the BlueAnt S4 also doubles up as a hands-free gateway to the world, where you can access stock quotes, movie times, weather, sports, news and traffic updates simply by saying the appropriate words. Sounds pretty cool, eh? The S4 also boasts of being the first BlueAnt car speakerphone that can offer firmware upgrades down the road, where you can be sure that new features will be thrown in (while fixing old bugs) to further enhance the customer experience. Expect the BlueAnt S4 to retail for $99.99 a pop – now how about that?

Press Release