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<\/p>\nInside a Lawrenceville warehouse, Michael Lutsky holds out a small speaker and plays a clip of a woman speaking Japanese.<\/p>\n
He asks an assembled group to form a picture of the person behind the voice in their minds, then explains how the sound from vocal cords can be analyzed to determine a person\u2019s age, height, ethnicity, and even create a sketch of their face.<\/p>\n
Lutsky plays the clip again and a woman\u2019s face appears on a screen behind him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe thing that’s kind of odd is that it doesn’t \u2014 to me anyway \u2014 it does not look like a Japanese-style face. It’s a little bit more Anglo,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
So, he pulled up the source: the YouTube channel of a German woman living in Tokyo.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe point there is that it’s not speech-to-text,\u201d said Lutsky, chief strategy officer of Carnegie Foundry. \u201cWe don’t care what language it is and it has no bearing on the other information that’s being pulled out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lutsky said they\u2019ve packaged the voice analysis tool and made it available to banks to identify impersonation attempts through the startup VoxEQ.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a tool that can actually protect you from a fraudster or your teenager trying to get a credit card,\u201d Lutsky said.<\/p>\n
VoxEQ is one of a few companies created with help from Carnegie Foundry, which seeks to commercialize the science coming out of universities.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s an example of the kind of \u201cinnovation economy\u201d that the Shapiro administration is trying to encourage with the Innovate in PA 2.0 program.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Department of Community and Economic Development Secretary Rick Siger speaks about the Innovate in PA 2.0 program at the National Robotics Engineering Center in Lawrenceville on Aug. 14, 2026.<\/p>\n
Department of Economic and Community Development Secretary Rick Siger said the $125 million made available for the program in the most recent state budget aims to close the gap between invention and commercialization, attract outside investment to the state, and create jobs.<\/p>\n
Siger visited Carnegie Mellon University\u2019s National Robotics Engineering Center on Friday to highlight the program, which the administration is working to finalize.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe this is going to be a real shot in the arm for innovators and entrepreneurs, all while enhancing our competitive position, solidifying our economy amidst \u2014 let’s be real \u2014 a very rapidly changing technology landscape,\u201d Siger said.<\/p>\n