We're opening the Japan Developer Program, with ElevenLabs - Full Press Release Here
Applications for the OpenHome Japan Developer Program are open today at dev.openhome.com. Accepted developers get ElevenLabs credits to spend on their OpenHome projects, plus documentation and community support in Japanese and English.
ElevenLabs Japan G.K. is our featured voice partner for the program, and our first voice partnership in Japan.
Shannon, our CEO, on why we're putting this much into one country: "Japan has a long history of technology innovation in consumer hardware, and we're committed to bringing the next generation of AI and voice interfaces to the Japanese ecosystem. We think some of the most interesting ambient AI products will come from Japan."
Why voice, and why this partner
We've been shipping DevKits to Japan since the spring, and the pattern in what people build there is hard to miss. A YouTube Live companion that reads and reacts to chat. An ambient task manager that listens while you work. A baby tracker you talk to with one hand full. These are all applications where the assistant talks more than it types, and where a voice that sounds slightly off is worse than no voice at all.
Japanese makes that bar higher than English does. Pitch accent changes meaning. Politeness level changes with who's in the room. Intonation carries a lot of what a sentence is actually doing. A model that gets the phonemes right and the melody wrong produces something that's technically correct and unpleasant to live with, which matters more when the voice is coming out of a speaker on your kitchen counter than when it's a browser tab you can close.
ElevenLabs builds the text-to-speech and speech-to-text models we think handle this best, and their Japan team have been fantastic to work with. Their TTS and STT models are now featured in the OpenHome developer SDK.
Jim Tamura, who runs Japan and Korea at ElevenLabs, sees it from their side: "Japan's developers have a strong track record of turning advanced technologies into useful products. We're pleased to support OpenHome's program and help builders explore natural Japanese voice experiences in real-world devices."
How the program works
The program is selective and we review every application by hand. To apply:
Sign up at dev.openhome.com
Say in your message that you're applying for the Japan Developer Program with ElevenLabs
Tell us what you want to build and why you want to build it
Write in Japanese or English, whichever you'd rather use. Both get read by someone on the team.
Accepted participants receive a limited allocation of ElevenLabs credits for use on OpenHome projects. Credit allocations are subject to approval and availability.
That third point is the one we actually weigh. A rough idea for a device that does one specific thing well will get further with us than a polished plan for a general assistant.
Apply
Applications are at dev.openhome.com. If you're already building on an OpenHome DevKit, mention it in your application and we'll pull your project history.
Questions about the program can go to press@openhome.com, or find us in the OpenHome Discord.
About ElevenLabs ElevenLabs is an AI research and product company transforming how people interact with technology. ElevenAPI gives developers access to its AI audio models, including speech synthesis and speech recognition. More at elevenlabs.io.