Our Analysts' Insights

In recent conversations, many enterprises and language service providers have expressed concern about the long-term careers and livelihoods of linguists and of LSP intermediaries. A large high-tech enterprise relayed to us that machine translation (MT) is becoming the dominant source of its global content. Language service providers regularly mention their prices being driven ever lower by fierce competition. Long-time language industry workers worry about the Uberization of a profession that of...

Enterprises that used to hold in-person events for customers, employees, partners, or investors have tried to move efficiently to a virtual format over the last few months. Despite the challenges, many organizations succeeded at the conversion, but a disproportionate number were only able to offer prerecorded content with offline subtitling. Companies are now pausing to reflect on the first wave of events and investigate the entire array of alternatives available for supporting these multilingua...

2020 started out with great financial momentum. The MSCI All Country World Index of large-, mid-, and small-cap stocks across 23 developed and 26 developing markets had risen almost 24% over 2018, an ounce of gold was worth 18% more than 12 months prior, and private equity groups had accumulated US$1.5 trillion in funds to invest. Businesses were primed for a stellar 2020, but by March, COVID-19 pushed most of the world to shelter in place. Companies shut down, employees were furloughed, and lif...

A recent examination of how computing power has changed over time calculated how much it would cost today to rent all of the computer capacity that existed at various points in the past. Up until 1968 all the worlds computers’ combined capabilities fell short of what a single server could do in 2018. It was not until 1974 that the then-current capacity (roughly equal to 0.43 teraflops) would exceed £100/month to lease in today’s costs. This exponential drop in the real cost of computing power ...

If your organization creates or implements software – and whose doesn’t these days in some form or another – you have to figure out ways to test it to ensure that it will meet international user needs. Our survey and interviews with 21 global enterprises that depend on automated testing in February and March 2020 demonstrates that software testing only finds what’s wrong after the fact and within the constraints of the original design. More staff performing more automated tests will not disc...

On September 21st Paris-based Acolad Group announced that it would acquire Luxembourg-based Amplexor. While the firms did not disclose the terms, their deal combines the 12th- (Amplexor) and 13th-ranked (Acolad Group) companies on CSA Research’s list of 100 largest language service providers. Following the acquisition, Acolad nouveau will have a combined US$307 million based on 2019 revenue (after subtracting about US$41 million in Amplexor revenue that will not be included in the sale). The me...

Remote simultaneous interpreting (RSI) platforms create a virtual booth where interpreters can pass the microphone back and forth as they interpret an event in real-time. They are designed to eliminate communication barriers on calls and in meetings, conferences, and other event types, so that participants who do not speak the same language can still participate in the exchange.

COVID-19 has changed the way people work – possibly forever. Those who could easily do so – office workers, financial staff, IT, and many others – have been working from home since early in the pandemic. Retail businesses were forced to make a quick acceleration in their online shopping experiences – meaning that at least some of their staff are now able to do their jobs from somewhere other than a store, warehouse, or delivery van. People are becoming accustomed to working from locations ot...

In late August, UK-based RWS Holdings announced that it would acquire fellow UK supplier SDL in an all-share deal. We analyzed the importance to the market of that deal in “RWS Absorbs SDL – The Business Story.” Here we analyze the impact of the acquisition on buyers and suppliers of SDL’s language and content management technology – and recommend some next steps for the soon-to-be new owners of storied brands like Trados and WorldServer.

In late August 2020, UK-based RWS Holdings announced that it would acquire fellow UK supplier SDL in an all-share deal that valued the latter at £809 million (US$1.07 billion). This transaction will merge the fourth- (SDL) and fifth-ranked (RWS Holdings) LSPs on CSA Research’s list of 100 largest language service providers. It will shuffle the ranking of leading LSPs on our list (see Figure) – and has the potential to touch many industry participants – suppliers and buyers, both – in the lan...