SDL is on a mission...

We call this Global Information Management and we achieve it by providing the technology and services to help corporations conquer language.  With SDL any information can be delivered into any language - quickly, efficiently and consistently.

SDL is on a mission – a mission to help the world’s corporations drive global brand consistency and accelerate time-to-market for all a company’s global content.  Quoted on the London Stock Exchange it has grown to be a global market leader with three core businesses – technology for the translation supply chain, language service provision and true global web content management.

The changing face of global business

Global corporations are faced with new challenges today that have never been seen before. Since the advent of the internet, improved communications and the implementation of free trade agreements between countries, the face of business has changed forever and companies are faced with competition from places never seen before.  In addition, consumers are no longer worried about where products come from – so long as they arrive on time and they are what the consumer wanted, then they are happy. When something ceases to function, there is not the same desire to fix it – “throw it away and buy another” is the motto of the younger generation. 

This brings enormous pressure on companies as they strive to remain agile and competitive in the face of increasing global competition.  Cutting time-to-market, delivering a unique customer experience and protecting global brands are now major imperatives that have been impacted by the immediacy of the internet.  Gone are the days when a company could take a year to build a product, ship it to foreign markets and leave it to their subsidiaries to tailor it over time to the requirements of different markets.  The internet is immediate and information is immediately available to a global audience.  Global corporations are now aware that they need a more effective strategy for ensuring their information is made available in the language of their customers – quickly, efficiently and accurately.

The importance of the translation supply chain

The customer is king.  When faced with different products to choose from, the customer will always go for the product that feels right to them – and language is a key element of that consideration.  Yet delivering language is complicated, as it involves people who are spread across the world. 

Typically a corporation will manage the localization process through one or more corporate language departments.  They may have internal translators, or they may outsource to one or more Language Service Providers.  Those LSPs will either use internal resources or themselves outsource to professional freelance translators around the world.  This is the translation supply chain.  Connecting these people was never a problem before the arrival of the internet – information was simply shipped by email to a subsidiary in a foreign country where the translation process occurred using local agencies. It happened, no-one complained and life continued.

So what’s different now?  The answer is “the internet”.  Suddenly companies want information more quickly, and in more languages.  The translation supply chain is being squeezed harder than ever before – there are literally not enough translators in the world to manage the vast increase in language requirements coming from corporations around the world.

The answer to the problem is technology – and this is a critical element of the strategy of SDL – enablement of the translation supply chain through an integrated platform of technology to empower corporations to efficiently manage the process of delivering corporate information to the globe. We call it Global Information Management (GIM).

The role of technology in the translation supply chain

You will never take the human out of the translation process because language is a living breathing experience that changes with time and reflects the culture of peoples.  It is unlikely that automated, or machine translation alone will ever deliver that ultimate experience, or the quality that companies require for their brand.  Hence humans are an essential component of the process of translation and the role of technology is to ensure that they are working efficiently and in harmony with the needs of their clients – the end-user corporation.

However, automated translation is important and SDL continues to invest in its Knowledge-based Translation System (called SDL KbTS).  KbTS has provided a valuable service to the world’s leading brands for over three years and combines machine translation with translation memories, dictionaries, automated workflow and human post-editing to deliver publishable quality multilingual content up to 50% faster and at up to 40% lower cost than traditional translation processes. This proven and award-winning solution is used by organizations such as Best Western, The Chrysler Group, CNH, HP, RS Components and more.

SDL identified many years ago that the management of increasing volumes of content was difficult and  that technology would play a critical role.  SDL sought to develop a technology base to assist in automating critical processes of the supply chain whilst leaving the ultimate translation process to humans.

There are four major components of the technology story – starting with the creation of content, the storing of that content, the translation process and the publishing of content to one or more different channels.  These are all intricately linked with one another and understanding their interdependencies drives greater efficiency and quality – as an example, making reference to previously translated content at the authoring stage will improve the end-to-end content creation process.

SDL’s technology strategy is to provide a technology enabled and connected translation supply chain, enabling corporations from any country to utilise the services of any LSP and any professional freelance translator to create and maintain high quality multilingual content quickly.  This is the SDL GIM platform.

Technology for the translation supply chain

SDL acquired Trados in 2005.  Already established as the defacto standard for translation software, Trados is now used by more than 80% of the world’s professional translators.  SDL’s strategy for Trados is to develop it further in order to provide the most productive translation toolset integrated with the enterprise software used by the end-user corporation.  With the release of SDL TMS 2007 and SDL Trados 2007, that integration was delivered.  Suddenly users of Trados 2007 could automatically receive from SDL TMS 2007 content packaged into a format easily understood by the translators and designed to include the information required for translation – including for example the context of that information.

In addition, managing the translation process across a group of translators is time consuming – the delivery of SDL Trados Synergy provided an effective project management tool to assist that process and help all components of the supply chain to work together efficiently.

SDL Language Services

SDL provides a range of services to help corporations manage the delivery of multilingual content.  In addition to business consulting services SDL provides language service delivery through an extensive connected network of in-house translators.  Utilizing SDL technology this network of translators provides peace of mind and a consistent level of service to global corporations - no matter what their language requirements.

SDL global web content management

Today every company is looking at how to utilise web-based technologies to market to, sell to and support their customers.  It is a natural extension of the SDL strategy to link the initial XML web-content delivery with the back-end translation supply chain to enable for the first time ever the efficient creation and maintenance of multilingual websites.  This serves not only to deliver an integrated end-to-end solution, but also accelerates the understanding of the importance of the translation supply chain within senior management of end-user corporations.  For more information on how SDL can help deliver truely global web content management, please visit www.tridion.com.

The future?

We live in a world where communication is king.  Over time more and more content will be delivered through web-based technologies.  Corporations across the globe strive to compete by marketing and selling through the web whilst looking at innovative ways of lowering the total cost of delivering global support to their customers.  SDL aspires to provide solutions to manage global content, which means managing all global content within an enterprise corporation and managing the complex translation supply chain, enabling the world to communicate in the chosen language of the customer – whatever that language will be.  What greater role can a company have than helping the world communicate?