Like Christopher Columbus accidentally encountering the Americas, customers are encountering speech recognition when they connect with call centers.

Speech recognition tools generally fall into one of two groups: those that call centers implement on-site and those that developers of these tools host off-site.

Yet, as TuVox's acquisition of NetByTel suggests, these categories are starting to overlap. Cupertino, CA-based TuVox, which develops speech recognition software that call centers typically deploy on their premises, now offers hosted speech recognition systems from NetByTel.

It's too early to say whether this particular acquisition is indicative of a trend. But the combination of TuVox and NetByTel does suggest that it won't be long until the distinction between and on-site and hosted applications becomes a matter of how well call centers implement them rather than only how they deliver them.