Beyond words
Assistive technology to build a barrier free world. Dot Inc. produces a range of ‘world's first’ tactile Braille displays that offer blind/low-vision users a refreshable surface with the option to touch whatever is displayed on the screen, bringing the community one step closer to digital equality.
Dot Incorporation is an innovative startup that focuses on developing solutions for the visually impaired. It all began with their first product, the Dot Watch, which utilised Braille language to make time readable through touch. The success of the Dot Watch led them to create the Dot Mini, a device similar to Kindle but designed for blind individuals, enabling them to read entire books sentence by sentence. Despite its capabilities, the Dot Mini faced limitations as it could only offer pre-translated material in Braille, lacking the ability to translate content in real-time.
The global population of blind and visually-impaired people amounts to approximately 285 million, with severely limited access to content that is effortlessly available to the sighted. Currently, only 3% of accessible texts are available in Braille, partly due to the complexity of accurately translating content. The rules of Braille Grade II are intricate, with numerous context-dependent and interlaced abbreviations, requiring an experienced human reviewer to ensure accurate translations.
Dot Incorporation took on the challenge of developing an autonomous engine that could automatically translate texts from English to Braille and vice versa. Their goal was to eliminate the need for human intervention, integrate it into their devices, and enable real-time translation of PDFs and web pages. However, the lack of research and available material in this area made the task challenging. They eventually employed a combination of rules-based and machine-learning approaches, utilising a tailored RNN-based recurrent neural network to learn the complex rules of Braille.
The result of their efforts was the Dot Translation Engine, the world's first Braille translation engine based on AI. It outperformed existing rule-based software in both precision and speed, allowing for the translation of entire books, websites, and PDFs in mere seconds. The engine continually learns from each use, further improving its accuracy over time. With Dot Translate, Dot Incorporation brings the world one step closer to achieving barrier-free access to information for the visually impaired.
As an ethical enterprise dedicated to accessibility and inclusivity, Kidwonder is inspired by the work of Dot Inc. and looks forward to integrating their technology into future Kidwonder experiences to create rich interaction for visually impaired children and adults.
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