Petr Schwarz’s journey to founding Phonexia

All journeys of Phonexia founders are a little bit different. So what is my story? Well, the first time I read about speech technologies was when I was in high school. I felt that it was something with a real potential and so I started looking into the issue more closely.

Eventually I entered the university and that had me looking for ways to continue with speech technologies. It was then that I met Honza Černocký, who was not only interested in speech tech but who was then also founding the Speech@FIT group. Honza managed to surround himself with people that were motivated to work, and it was thanks to his support that quite a few of us got to travel and study abroad, where we gained a lot of experience. During these internships, we found out about the international comparative campaigns for which we signed up.

That was the first time we drew attention to ourselves, as we placed really well. Suddenly, all sorts of people experienced in the field started cooperating with us, which led us to creating the best research system for identifying speakers. At that moment, inquiries from the commercial sector started coming and we had to consider how we should commercialize our research.

That was not possible in the academical environment, which is why we founded Phonexia in 2006. We were 6 researchers from Speech@FIT with no knowledge of the business world. We knew that we have a vision, that we believe in the potential of speech technologies, that we wish to discover something new, that we are friends, and that we mainly want to help people, which is something that has remained true. At that time, most of the people considered our technology to be just sci-fi, but the trust of a few customers allowed us to take off.

And now? We have a history of 12 years, many motivated employees that keep pushing each other forward, and a vision to employ more people soon. There is not much to add. Only perhaps that if you see the potential of speech technologies and love to learn new things, just like we do, don’t hesitate to stop by; after all, you can find us just 500m away from FIT. And who knows, maybe soon we’ll be seeing each other daily.

Petr Schwarz, CTO