American Accents (and AI) Could Save India’s Outsourcing

(Bloomberg Opinion) — For Tomato.ai and other California-based startups trying to crack the code of real-time accent conversion, the old “you like tomayto, I like tomahto” is no reason to call the whole customer-service thing off. If done right, accent neutralization could have significant potential in India — a country in the grip of an employment crisis.

The outlook for computer software, which has led the country’s world-beating growth in services exports for two decades, is highly uncertain. Global retailers and manufacturers could pause large IT projects to weigh the impact of US tariffs. Banks and asset managers may also cut back on technology spending as they assess the impact on financial flows.