The Increasing Impact of Technology on Translation

The Increasing Impact of Technology on

Translation

The long-expected technical revolution is here. Electronic translation is no longer just

a free sample on the internet. It is now entering the ‘real’ economy of the translation
industry and it changes everything.

The translation and localization industry is changing quickly. This annual snapshot of
the future emphasises on three main areas: technology, translation and localization
services and languages.
A Short History of the Translation Industry

Over a period of four decades, the translation industry has gone through efficient
shifts of transformation, instigated by changes in the business and technological
environment.

Quality analysis tools, enhanced connectivity and improved translation memories are
all playing a vital role in this.

A lot of people automatically portray machine translation – Google Translate, when

you mention the impact of technology on translation. Artificial intelligence (AI) in the
translation industry is certainly something that needs to be inspected. But that’s far
from the only way in which advancing tech is affecting industry translations.

Individual translators are using a variety of technological innovations to ramp up both

the speed at which they work and the quality. This means that they can produce
better translations in less time, leading to the potential to earn more or to enjoy more
free time, depending on the individual translator’s priorities.

We’ve already seen AI in use in different ways within the translation and localization
industry and this is certainly going to continue. The probability is simply huge. Its
usage for natural language processing (NLP) is a good instance of this.
Improved Quality

Good translation jobs urge the highest quality output. When technology is used to
enhance output quality, the improved results are always a great thing. Today, there
are modern tools that can be used in quality analysis and documentation, to ensure
that everything is of the highest achievable quality. They can even be working during
the translation process to enhance accuracy and consistency.

Improved Productivity

Technology can be employed to help accelerate the overall translation process. This
reduces work hours and allows for better quality control while giving translation
companies the capacity to take up more work. Simple approach like being able to
translate content immediately it comes online as against to doing everything in
batches have remarkable impacts on the overall turn around times and speeds.
Eventually, this time saved adds up, and the translation companies will be able to
have less content work. This means quicker turn around times for customers.

Better Connectivity

Since modern translation methods demand the utilisation of several different tools, it
is necessary to make sure that all these tools communicate with each other.
Compatibility is a must because files need to be moved from one source to another.
Having a network of interconnected tools saves a lot of time, effort and money in the
long run, easing the translation process as a whole. Additionally, translation services
can be very useful for many industries, mainly for customer service. The
technological improvements in translation have enhanced the quality of customer
service as they have to constantly interact with people from different countries and
who speak different languages. This makes up their work easy and decreases their
working hours trying to translate themselves or seeking help from professional
translators.
E-commerce

Translation automation has changed the e-commerce industry. Researches have

shown that 72% of consumers spend all their time on websites in their native
languages. This shows that if you are an e-commerce business, you have access to
72% of an opportunity by simply listing in that particular language. When 50% of
people believe products in languages that they speak, and 54% of consumers trust
language is more crucial than price, the importance of good, high-quality translation
in the e-commerce industry becomes more and more evident. Furthermore, many e-
commerce shops now use this te