THE VOICE-ACTIVATION system that I tested works.
It obeyed instructions delivered with my careful English accent as readily as it responded to the confident American Midwestern tones of my instructor, Hakan Kostepen, Visteon's voice technology manager.
The system accepted and repeated phone numbers and dialed them when told to do so.
It switched on the entertainment functions and changed stations and CD tracks to order, and it adjusted the temperature on command, all with no stumbles.