Qualcomm's Toq smartwatch got the Dick Tracy treatment on Monday with a new feature dubbed "Toq Talk."
Powered by Nuance's voice-to-text technology, Toq Talk lets owners create and respond to text messages using their voices.
Nuance is one of the industry leaders in in speech recognition and natural language processing. It powers Siri on iOS and is embedded in many other systems spanning various industries. Nuance also powers the voice-input on the original Galaxy Gear smartwatch.
For now, the feature is restricted to the text messaging app. You're also limited to nine seconds of speech input -- but that should be enough to compose a quick message or send a quick reply.
It's important to remember, however, that Qualcomm isn't selling the Toq through traditional consumer channels. It's designed more as a reference point so other manufacturers can see what's possible in the wearable space, rather than a fully-realized product.
It's not hard to imagine that this sort of technology -- especially aligned with some of the cloud-based systems Nuance is investing in -- powering a wide array of voice-controlled interfaces for the wearable market.