Gracenote Enhances Toyota Entune Music Experience

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 11, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW (CES) - Gracenote^® today announced its technologies and music metadata help make it easier for Toyota drivers to enjoy and manage their digital music collection with Toyota Entune™-enabled multimedia systems. Entune, which in 2011 was given the "CNET Best of CES" award for Car Tech, is a revolutionary new multimedia system that lets Toyota drivers and passengers use voice and touch commands to connect to popular apps and interact with their music on mobile devices.

The Entune-enabled system in select 2012 model year Toyota vehicles features Gracenote licensed Album Cover Art, Playlist Plus™ and MediaVOCS® technologies. When a driver's iPod, smart phone or USB drive is connected inside the car, the Gracenote Playlist Plus technology jumps into action, identifying artist and album names to help drivers better navigate their music collection through the car audio system. Gracenote Playlist Plus recognizes inconsistent and conflicting artist spellings in the collection, such as "AC-DC," "AC/DC" or "AC.DC," and uses this intelligence to improve music playlisting and voice control.

To help drivers hear more of the music they love, Gracenote Playlist Plus also associates detailed Genre information (e.g. Indie Rock, Punk, Classic R&B and Ska), Origin (e.g. U.S.—New York, England—London), Era (e.g. 1970, 1980s) with the driver's music collection, letting them automatically create similar music playlists spanning multiple genres. For instance, if a driver is listening to The Clash, they can simply say "Play More Like This" to hear similar artists and music from the band's Genre (e.g. Classic Punk), Origin (England—London) and Era (1970s).

Many voice recognition and text-to-speech systems struggle with irregular spellings and hard to pronounce artist and album names. Gracenote MediaVOCS technology enhances the accuracy of Toyota's voice-recognition capabilities for music search. For instance, Gracenote MediaVOCS helps the voice-recognition system understand "Depeche Mode" and "INXS" are the correct spellings and pronunciations of bands or artists. And drivers can use "Snoop," "CCR," "The Fab Four" and thousands of other artist nicknames as voice commands to access music.

"With digital music collections on smart phones and other connected devices now reaching into hundreds and even thousands of songs, it is critical to provide drivers a safe and easy way to interact with their music," said Vadim Brenner, vice president of product at Gracenote. "The pairing of Gracenote's technology and data intelligence with the innovative Entune multimedia system provides Toyota drivers a powerful in-car entertainment experience, where they can access and manage all of their music while keeping their attention on the road."

The Gracenote Global Media Database, which provides the backbone for some of the world's most popular entertainment products, is the largest and most comprehensive music database in the world featuring music and video metadata and licensed cover art images. With 130 million tracks and eight million albums, the database processes more than 10 billion queries per month and powers a billion devices, including smart phones, PCs, automotive systems and HDTVs, from leading brands.

About Gracenote
A pioneer in digital media, Gracenote, Inc. provides music and video content and technologies to the world's hottest entertainment products and brands. The company's partners in the entertainment community include major music publishers and labels, prominent independents and movie studios and television networks. A wholly owned, independent subsidiary of the Sony Corporation of America (SCA), Gracenote has offices in Tokyo, Munich, Berlin, Seoul, and Taipei with worldwide headquarters in Emeryville, California. For more information, follow us at www.facebook.com/PoweredbyGracenote

Gracenote and MediaVOCS are registered trademarks of Gracenote, Inc. All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

For More Information Contact:
Veronica Skelton
Concept PR for Gracenote
415.342.3435
[email protected]

Graham McKenna
Director of Marketing Communications, Gracenote
510.428.7288
[email protected]

SOURCE Gracenote