Swype quickly became a favorite to many when it originally launched as beta for Android devices a few years ago. It was made by the same guy that invented T9, and both of his companies have been bought by Nuance. Nuance believes its an input technology company, mostly known as a voice technology company, but it’s now looking into the typing technology as well.
They made a good acquisition with Swype, as it still is one of the best keyboard apps around, although lately SwiftKey, the keyboard that is very good at predicting what you’re going to write, has offered it some strong competition. This brings us to the latest version of Swype, which also seems to include technology that learns the words you’re typing, can associate them, and then can predict what you’re going to say next, much like Swype.
Nuance is also known for voice tech, so they included Dragon Dictation straight into the keyboard, which you can now use instead of Google’s Voice tech. One problem with Swype, though, is that other than some limited beta programs, it usually comes with bundled with phones, so it’s sold to OEM’s, rather than straight to users. This is unfortunate, as I’m sure many would’ve been interested in buying it.
Samsung and some Motorola phones usually come bundled with it, but now that a bigger company like Nuance, which has T9 on every feature phone on the planet, is owning it, this could mean that it will be available on a lot more phones, too. Check out a quick video demoing the new Swype app:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4H-Ci8jEYXc