Our Analysts' Insights

CSA Research published its much anticipated annual report, “The Language Services Market: 2015,” in early July. Let’s highlight some of the most interesting points:

• The market continues to grow. The 2015 market for outsourced language services and supporting technology is US$38.16 billion. This shows a growth rate of 6.46% which is impressive given pressures on the market such as foreign exchange rate fluctuations and European economic challenges. We project that the market will grow to around $47 billion by 2018.

• There’s more contention for the top spots on our global list. This year 109 companies qualified for our annual list of the 100 largest language service providers. While the 10 biggest LSPs remain almost unchanged since last year (except in their order of appearance), nineties in revenue opened up more opportunities for companies hovering around the cut-off.

• 191 companies qualified for regional rankings. In addition to the 109 largest companies, CSA Research also ranks companies in nine regions using the United Nations categorization. These lists highlight companies that might not make the global ranking, but are the biggest in their regions. As always, companies qualify for specific regions depending on the groupings based on headquarter location. This year we saw a few companies migrate to new regions because they changed the location of their main offices.

•  A bevy of tables and charts addressing a buffet of topics. The report includes projected growth rates for the industry through 2019 with region-specific breakdowns, reporting on the fastest-growing services, a breakdown of the market for technology sold by LSPs and technology providers, and critical benchmarks for LSP financial performance, including differences by company size and region.

Data and analysis from this year’s report have already been cited in EContent magazine, Huffington Post, and Inc. magazine. Besides the media visibility that this research gives to the language services and technology industry, CSA Research’s annual report is widely read by buyers who use it to educate themselves about issues and resources in the market. Finally, private equity and other investors use the report to learn about the market, trends, and industry leaders.