Post on 13-Jan-2016
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Latin America:
A Potential Translation & Localization
Power House
ByCharles Campbell
President, spanishbackoffice SA
An overview of the market, the players, and the trends
A volatile, incipient and exciting market
A handful of small & medium sized dynamic translation and localization companies characterized by:
Hardworking, talented and gutsy management (cojones)
Low profile: sales by Internet/e-mail
Dependence on language industry clients
Very little full scale localization
Translation, Editing, Proofreading
Project Management
DTP
Software Testing
Others???Localization
Proprietary Products ?
Multilingual Projects ?
CM
The services provided:
Our largely undeveloped potential:
Culturally rich and diverse countries
Education: free universities in Argentina (!!!)
Comparatively low costs
Time zone compatibility with North America
Strong established translation and publishing industries
Steadily growing local software industry
Lots of translators (!)
A comparison with Eastern Europe:
Where are the Moravias, Skrivaneks and Argos of Latin America?
Eastern Europe emerged from dictatorship only 16 years ago but has quickly prospered (generally speaking). Why?
It is Europe after all – short distances to clients
Strong exact sciences and analytical focus at universities
Multilingual region
Sustained investment from Western Europe and the US
What is holding us back?
Few “real” companies
Very few quality project management/localization training events
Almost no cooperation with government, software companies, universities and other localization companies & professionals
Very little inter disciplinary cooperation with desk top publishers, engineers, programmers, localizers, etc.
No industry organization
IndustryOrganizations
Universities(public / private)
SoftwareIndustry
Freelancers
Translation &LocalizationCompanies
Cooperation !!!
If we don’t all hang together, we will surely all hang separately
A look forward to 2016: Questions to ask ourselves:
What if the peso revalues?
What if more multinationals like Moravia set up offices in Latin America?
What if server-based solutions and GMS systems replace in the box software?
What if rates continue to slide downwards?
What if quality translators/localizers get even harder to find?
What if the tax authorities (AFIP etc.) get serious about income remittance and employment taxes for subcontractors?
A look forward to 2016: Is this as good as it gets?
No!The future is bright,¡animémonos a más!