NAIROBI, Kenya, July 13 – Google has included Swahili on its conversational artificial intelligence (AI) service Bard, becoming the first language on the continent to be embedded in the solution.
The tech company also brought on board 39 new languages in 59 countries and territories.
Chinese, German, Spanish, Arabic, Hindi, and Spanish are some of the other dialects.
Users can now access Bard in their preferred language, with text-to-speech also enabled in eight languages.
“We’re excited that this is Bard’s largest expansion to date – we see its global availability as a great democratizer of knowledge,” Google Sub-Saharan Africa Head of Communications and Public Affairs Dorothy Ooko said.
“That’s why we created Bard: to help you explore that curiosity, augment your imagination and ultimately get your ideas off the ground — not just by answering your questions, but by helping you build on them,” Ooko added.
According to UNESCO, Swahili is among the 10 most widely spoken languages in the world, with more than 200 million speakers.
“The launch of Bard in Swahili is a major milestone as it allows Bard to reach even more people in Africa, where approximately 150 million people speak Swahili,” Google Language Manager Rachael Ndichu said.
“This makes Bard more accessible to everyone in the region, and we believe that it has the potential to be a powerful tool for creativity and learning,” he said.
“We are excited to see how people in the region use Bard to explore their ideas and discover new things.”
As part of the expansion, the new updates launched include Listen to Responses, which is available in over 40 languages and allows users to listen to Bard’s responses once they select the sound icon.
This is especially helpful if they want to hear the correct pronunciation of a word or listen to a poem or script.
Users can also now adjust Bard’s responses by changing the tone and style of its responses to five different options: simple, long, short, professional, or casual.
This feature is live in English and will expand to new languages soon.
