SlatorPod

Jordan Evans, the CEO of Language Network, joins SlatorPod to talk about the evolution of his family-founded language service provider (LSP) and his sales-focused growth strategy.Jordan's professional trajectory began with a blend of sales, tech startups, and a stint as a linguist and translator, before acquiring Language Network and achieving significant growth.Regarding growth strategies, Jordan discusses the challenges and benefits of acquisitions, emphasizing the importance of finding the right fit and maintaining stability during integration. He advises starting with acquisitions within one's core expertise before branching out into new areas.The conversation shifts to sales and marketing in the language industry, with Jordan highlighting the need to cut through the noise and engage customers effectively, whether through traditional methods like cold calling or newer digital channels.When it comes to the role of AI in language services, Jordan advocates for adopting off-the-shelf technologies to meet customer needs efficiently while allowing for scalability and adaptability.The CEO attributes the growth of interpreting in the US to increased awareness of language accessibility issues and funding initiatives, especially in sectors like healthcare and immigration.Jordan advises that LSPs should capitalize on their unique strengths and niches, enabling them to differentiate themselves from larger competitors and maximize value for clients.

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week, with Head of Research Anna Wyndham joining to give a breakdown of the 2024 Slator Language AI 50 Under 50, a list highlighting 50 of the newest and most notable language AI companies.The list focuses on 50 language AI companies under 50 months old, showcasing their innovations in speech-to-text, machine translation, speech synthesis, and more.Esther talks about Disney's Accelerator Program, which invested in two language AI startups: ElevenLabs and AudioShake. AudioShake uses AI to parse audio tracks for mixing or dubbing and ElevenLabs, a multilingual AI voice startup, recently raised USD 80m.Florian mentions AnthropicAI's new language model, Claude 3 Opus, and shared a user's experience testing it for translating a low-resource language (Circassian) with impressive results. (note: a few hours after the podcast production was finished, the user gave an update that the model was trained on Circassian).Florian briefly touches on Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI, with translation getting a shoutout as a key early use case for large language models.Esther provides an overview of Honyaku Center's financial results for Q3 2024, where overall revenues saw a 3% growth and translation remained the primary revenue driver.Esther shares news about recent layoffs at Sega of America, affecting 61 temp workers from quality assurance and localization.

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week, with Women in Localization opening a new chapter in Switzerland and SlatorCon coming to Silicon Valley on September 5th.Florian shares insights from RWS’ Annual General Meeting, where under the new leadership of Chairman Julie Southern, the language service provider (LSP) highlighted its resilience amid global uncertainty.Esther gives an overview of the financial results for AMN Language Services and Ai-Media, with the former reporting strong performance for its language services and the latter attributing its revenue increase to an ongoing shift to its SaaS offering.Versacom, a prominent Canadian LSP, announces a minority investment from Norea Capital, with plans to focus on AI-enhanced solutions. Meanwhile, an investment banking industry insider revealed Iyuno may go public, targeting a valuation range between USD 2.25 bn and USD 3 bn.Over in the US, Boostlingo recorded a 60% year-over-year increase in annual recurring revenue in 2023, highlighting the thriving demand for interpreting services.The podcast concludes with the recent launch of Green Terp Unveils GT Enhancer, a tool designed to assist human interpreters by removing background noises such as dog barks and baby cries.

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week with a first look at the newly released 2024 Slator Language Service Provider Index (LSPI) where they unpack the key findings from over 250 LSPs on the ranking.Leading the 2024 LSPI is Super Agency TransPerfect, who recently appointed Jin Lee as the new Co-CEO. Lee began as a project manager at the Super Agency before working through various production roles and rising through the ranks.Slator recently launched the first edition of its Language AI Briefing, a summary of the top AI stories, language AI startups, and notable AI developments. One such story covered real-time multilingual lip-sync provider Sync Labs’ open-source which shows users how to deploy and monetize their own lip-sync applications in a couple of hours.In M&A news, 2024 began strong with French LSP Powerling acquiring troubled WCS Group which recently filed for bankruptcy. Meanwhile, Belgium-based Jonckers and US-based Acclaro have merged, becoming a cross-Atlantic Leader LSP. In Israel, BLEND has bought local rival Manpower Language Solutions, citing a growing global interest in the Israeli market.

In the landmark 200th episode of the SlatorPod, we are joined by Anja Jones, Managing Director of AJT, to talk about the language service provider’s (LSP’s) journey to becoming a B Corp, a certification for businesses balancing profit with social and environmental responsibility.Anja touches upon the impact of large language models (LLMs), expressing concerns about ethical implications, copyright issues, and the environmental footprint associated with LLMs. She also discusses how a focus on the intricacies of European culture became their USP.When it comes to using AI in translation, Anja highlights that certain content types, such as marketing texts and transcreation, are still best handled by human translators due to the need for creativity and cultural sensitivity.The podcast shifts towards the need for regulation in the language AI industry. Anja points out the ethical implications of AI-generated content, particularly in scenarios like voice synthesis and deep fake technologies.Anja also talks about winning the 2023 ATC Ethical Business award, attributing it to their commitment to fair pay, transparent communication, and creating opportunities for new translators.Anja shares the LSP's plans for 2024, which include focusing on collaborations with value-aligned businesses, including sustainable fashion brands and companies leveraging AI for personalized Google Ads.

In this week’s SlatorPod, we are joined by Bart Maczynski, the VP of Machine Learning at Language Weaver, the translation tech brand of Super Agency RWS, to talk about the challenges and advancements in enterprise-grade machine translation (MT).The discussion delves into the distinctions between enterprise and consumer-grade MT, with challenges including data security, scalability, adaptability, user experience, and risk mitigation.Bart touches on the impact of large language models (LLMs) on the landscape, noting potential risks, such as deceptive fluency, and the need for control in enterprise settings.The VP discusses the recent launch of Evolve, an automated post-editing solution that combines auto-adaptive neural MT, machine translation quality estimation, and a secure, private LLM.Bart talks about the evolving landscape of language AI and the integration of MT into broader workflows, driven by innovations in orchestration and automation platforms.Bart shares insights into the future plans of Language Weaver, with a primary focus on bringing Evolve to the market and broadening its applications, supporting more languages, and exploring improvements and adaptations in various components.

John Tinsley, the VP of AI Solutions at language AI agency Translated, joins SlatorPod to talk about the challenges, advancements, and future directions of AI in the language industry. John shares his journey from founding machine translation (MT) pioneer ICONIC, selling it during the height of the pandemic to RWS, and now his current role focusing on connecting technology and capabilities with customer needs at Translated.He touches on the challenges of managing the noise around AI and the excitement and potential of generative AI, particularly in the context of language. He discusses the impact of large language models on translation and the challenges of multilingual content generation.John mentions the importance of having the right data for AI and highlights a new product initiative called Human-in-the-Loop. This initiative focuses on automating the process of improving MT by constantly fine-tuning it based on user feedback and human data.He also explores the dynamic landscape of innovation in the AI field, discussing the sources of innovation, the role of big tech companies, and the challenges of keeping up with the rapidly evolving research landscape.Looking ahead, John underscores the importance of ensuring enterprise readiness in MT, considering factors beyond just good output, such as fitting into existing workflows, cost-effectiveness, and scalability.

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week, with Super Early Bird ending soon for SlatorCon Remote March and a save-the-date announcement for SlatorCon London, scheduled in person for May 23, 2024.Florian talks about how translation GPTs are becoming increasingly available on OpenAI’s GPT store, highlighting the ease of building these models and the payment model for creators. The duo touches on the topic of AI-generated lip-synced translations, using the example of a machine-translated speech by Argentina’s new president at the World Economic Forum and debating its ethical implications.Esther’s M&A and funding corner features the acquisition of Systran by ChapsVision, the sale of Balthasar Ltd. to Translate.One, and the USD 18 million Series B funding round by Contents.com.

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week, with OpenAI recently launching its GPT store, allowing users to create their own GPT chat interfaces without the need for coding.One move that underscores OpenAI's influence in the language space is Albania's consideration of using ChatGPT for translating documents related to its EU accession bid. Duolingo is also reported to be laying off human translators in favor of relying more on AI for content curation and translation, which has seen significant user backlash.The duo talk about the challenges publicly traded LSPs faced in 2023, with none outperforming the MSCI world average. LSP stocks, including Honyaku Center, RWS, and Appen, experienced significant declines, while Duolingo's stock doubled despite its shift to AI.Esther covered key mergers and acquisitions in 2023. Lastly, the podcast highlighted leadership changes at Argos Multilingual, with Alexander Ulichnowski taking over as CEO and Joanna Weitz promoted to COO.

Vasco Pedro, Co-founder and CEO of language operations platform Unbabel, joins SlatorPod to talk about the transformative year of 2023 and its impact on the language technology landscape.Vasco discusses the AI boom in 2023, emphasizing the importance of recognizing AI as what he calls a cognitive prosthetic rather than a human replacement. He highlights the need for a new pricing model in translation and localization that accommodates AI solutions and allows for transparency, predictability, and agency for LangOps professionals.Touching on multilingual content generation, Vasco believes that while AI is making content creation easier, there is still a gap in quality between content creation and translation.Vasco emphasizes the importance of owning the entire value chain and reducing the complexity of translation processes to provide efficient solutions. He touches on some of Unbabel's features, including UnbabelMT for comparing machine translation options.The CEO outlines Unbabel's strategic acquisitions of EVS and Bablic, with the goal of expanding into new markets, acquiring clients, and integrating Unbabel's technology effectively.Vasco talks about taking part in the AI consortium in Portugal's Recovery and Resilience Plan, and how Unbabel is involved in projects such as Project Halo, which aims to develop a brain-to-computer interface for text-based communication with practical implications for conditions like ALS.When looking towards the future, Vasco emphasizes the importance of focusing on growth and continually improving the product's quality, speed, and cost-effectiveness.