SNCF is a long-standing client of Voxygen. SNCF was a pioneer in the world of brand voice through the voice of Simone Hérault, who is known and recognised by all users. The first version of Simone's TTS voice was created in 2008.

Why was Simone Hérault's digital voice created?

Certain uses require dynamic vocalisation, i.e. information is vocalised as and when users request it, without being known in advance. Only speech synthesis  allows dynamic vocalisation.

With the creation of Simone Hérault's digital voice, SNCF was also looking for autonomy and flexibility in the creation of its voice messages. The voice talent may not be available at short notice for recordings, and some messages are emergency messages.

Today, Simone's TTS voice, known as e-Mone, and her natural voice coexist harmoniously. The creation of the digital voice also makes it possible to immortalise this leading voice, which has become indispensable for communicating with SNCF users.

Use cases for text-to-speech at SNCF

Simone or e-Mone greets users on the 3635 customer service and other voice servers. E-Mone enables the rapid creation of messages for emergencies, incidents and new or temporary information to be broadcast. SNCF uses the Voxygen Server on-premise solution for its voice servers.

e-Mone digital voice is also being deployed 'on-board' via the Voxygen Device, on the ticket purchase terminals that are gradually being installed in all French stations to improve accessibility. It enables blind customers to use these terminals by providing voice guidance throughout the ticket purchase or exchange process.

SNCF is also using Voxygen's speech synthesis in English, Spanish, German, Italian and Dutch to create voice announcements. With these high-quality voices, the results are very satisfactory. They also significantly reduce costs and production times by avoiding the need to organise recordings with speakers for small, one-off volumes.

"I had good results when I produced announcements for Transilien in English and Spanish." 

These synthesised voices enable messages to be created quickly and independently using the Voxygen Studio interface. There may be special requirements for events such as the Rugby World Cup 2023. Messages are created on Voxygen Studio and then broadcast on the Transilien or TER networks, for example.

Voxygen also provides a local service to SNCF to produce mass messages for special events such as the Paris 2024 Olympics within short deadlines. Voxygen is renowned for its personalised services, responsiveness and creativity. SNCF thus benefits from Voxygen's advanced Voice Cloning technology, which makes it possible to preserve the pronunciation of station names in French in foreign-language messages.

The long-term collaboration between SNCF and Voxygen is fluid and constructive, and Voxygen is doing its utmost to ensure that SNCF benefits from the latest technological advances in terms of voice quality. E-Mone has been given a new lease of life and has been deployed in a neural version since the end of 2023.