Except for marketing and belles lettres, translators and their clients benefit greatly from using translation memory (TM) tools. This software automatically finds 100%, fuzzy, and in-context matches with previously translated text. What’s not to love? A lot, apparently. Common Sense Advisory estimates that 600,000 people punch the clock daily to translate words, However, suppliers like Atril, SDL, and WordFast have sold enough TM licenses to provision just a quarter of practicing translators. With over 100,000 SDLX and Trados licenses sold, SDL claims that 90% of the world’s professional translators employ its proudct, but that number doesn’t reflect the reality of the TM marketplace — most copies are held by translation agencies and the companies they translate for. Few freelancers purchase their own TM license, especially outside the North Atlantic region where penetration is highest. Cost and complexity typically stand in the way of this unfortunately discretionary purchase.

How can language software vendors increase translator reliance on their software? We’ve long suggested a US$99 price point, but over the last 20 months or so we’ve pushed the idea of free TM access à la gmail. This would involve an LSP or language technology firm giving translators a TM tool, storage of their translation memories, a machine translation engine tied into their TMs for MTM integration, a quiver of translator widgets, and a community of other translators to collaborate with. The price to translators would be information — such as their language pairs, subject matter expertise, availability, minimum rates, and other details — that they often share with portals like Aquarius, Proz, and TranslatorsCafé. Whoever offers this gmail of TM could support the effort with advertising (eyeballs) or corporate access to this pool of translators. None of this is revolutionary, but it will take a company with some real chutzpah to pull it off.

Which vendors are most likely to say “yes” to offering their TM tools for free along with a pile of storage and other widgets?

• SDL — not likely. As the company with the most revenue to lose from giving away its TM tools, we don’t expect SDL to make its tools free any time soon. Even a US$99 price point would be pretty messy to a services company deriving 21.9% of its revenue from software sales.
• Lionbridge — it does have Logoport. The biggest commercial LSP has the technology in-house, but fears sharing Logoport with freelancers who might compete with its own offering. Never say never: By offering this gmail model to all comers, Lionbridge could create a new generation of SaaS-enabled TM users.
• Lingotek — maybe. The company already offers a free online search engine that functions as a translation memory. Adding free space and functions could draw more translators. However, earlier this year Lingotek changed its business model to offer its engine behind the firewall of its larger government users, thus shifting its strategic focus and sales energy.
• Smaller TM players like Atril, Elanex, Kilgray, and WordFast don’t have the money or the bandwidth to fund this pitch for a bigger role in the market. Short of partnering or being acquired, this business model won’t be in the cards for 2008.
• Across and Idiom already give away client-side TM tools for use with their TMS products. While the prospect of reducing SDL TM sales would be gratifying, both companies would have to divert resources away from their server business. That wouldn’t be wise at this stage of their development. Ditto for LSPs with TMS such as Sajan, thebigword, Translations.com, and Transware.
• Aquarius, Proz, and TranslatorsCafé could buddy up with a language tool vendor to offer a free gmail-like package at their sites. While it would be a way to cement the relationship with translators, none have taken the initiative — yet.

How about someone from outside the industry who doesn’t have an interest in selling tools, but does have a stake in driving traffic regularly to its site? Think Ask, Google, or Yahoo!, three companies with a need to pull in — and retain — visitors. Any of them could buy a translation tool vendor out of the spare change they find behind the cushions in their couch. All it takes is a business case.