News

'Welocalize' joins Centre for Next Generation Localisation as Industry Partner

24 February 2011

Globalisation Services Multinational announces collaboration with Irish-based academia-industry research partnership.

Ireland’s status as world leader in software localisation was reinforced today, as translation supply-chain management multinational, Welocalize, Inc., announced that it is to join the Centre for Next Generation Localisation (CNGL) as industry partner.

The partnership will see the two organisations collaborate to address key challenges in localisation – a significant value-adding, multiplier component of the global software and content distribution industry.

With today’s investment, Welocalize becomes CNGL’s tenth full industry partner. Welocalize supports open-standards and developed GlobalSight, a collaborative, open-source initiative to develop a flexible and sustainable Translation Management System (TMS) that leverages and addresses the shared needs of the industry.

Speaking at the announcement at Dublin City University, Josef van Genabith, Director of CNGL, said “We strongly believe that our partnership with Welocalize will enable us to continue producing break-through technologies that help companies to adapt their products and services to the needs of global users. CNGL’s strong commercialisation model has already resulted in a strong flow of invention disclosures, patent applications and licensing agreements. We are confident that our collaboration with Welocalize will prove equally fruitful for both parties.”
Language barriers constitute a formidable obstacle to the free flow of information, products and services in an increasingly globalised economy and information society. To overcome these barriers, the Centre for Next Generation Localisation (CNGL) brings together academic researchers and industry experts to conduct ground-breaking research into next-generation localisation. This process involves the adaptation of digital content to culture, location and linguistic environment. CNGL’s more than 100 researchers at Dublin City University, Trinity College Dublin, University College Dublin and University of Limerick are helping to enable people interact with digital content, products and services in their own language, according to their own culture, and according to their own personal needs.
“Collaboration between Welocalize and the CNGL has already generated significant research outcomes and we are thrilled to offer our technology platform and support to the university,” says Smith Yewell, CEO and Founder of Welocalize. “We firmly believe that formalizing our productive relationship with the CNGL will accelerate industry advancements in order to revolutionize the industry.”
Welcoming Welocalize to the partnership, Tony O’Dowd, President of Alchemy Software Development and Chair of the Centre’s Industry Advisory Board, said: “In the three years since it began, CNGL has quickly established itself as a major resource to the localisation industry, one that has helped visibly maintain Ireland’s reputation for innovation and leadership in localisation. We are now seeing significant emerging opportunities for new high-potential start-up companies to bring technologies to market and create jobs.”
Commenting on the significance of the announcement, John Travers, Director-General of Science Foundation Ireland, said: "Central to the transformation in Ireland's research landscape over the last decade has been the creation of clustered research centres of excellence incorporating an increasingly direct involvement of industry into the academic environment. It is a model that has been purposefully implemented, and we are now witnessing unprecedented multi-disciplinary engagement. Welocalize coming on board as an industry partner is an endorsement of CNGL's achievements to date and a clear indication that it is progressing towards delivering on its substantial commercial potential."
“I am thrilled about the tremendous impact and value of the CNGL partnership and the progress we will make together towards interoperability and connectivity innovations,”, commented Derek Coffey, VP of Technology & Professional Services of Welocalize.”We have many shared goals with the CNGL, and collaborating with the research groups within the CNGL will enable us to engage future localisation professionals for industry wide improvements through technological advancements.”

Welocalize, Inc. offers integrated globalisation services and products for the fluid and rapid deployment of enterprise content and applications to international markets. It provides globalisation consulting, translation, localisation, testing solutions and enterprise translation management tools that are optimised to be able to deliver on-demand translation in over 100 languages. Its clients include Autodesk, Inc.; Canon; Cisco Systems; Computer Associates; IBM; Microsoft; Sun and Symantec. With over 400 employees worldwide, Welocalize maintains 10 offices in the United States, UK, Germany, Ireland, Japan and China. Please visit www.welocalize.com for more information.

The Centre for Next Generation Localisation (CNGL) is a dynamic academia-industry partnership that conducts ground-breaking research into next-generation localisation (i.e. the process of adapting digital content to culture, location and linguistic environment) by addressing key challenges in information volume, access and personalisation. Co-funded by Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) and nine industry partners, CNGL is a world leading research centre seeking not only fundamental scientific advances but also translational economic and societal impact. Close collaboration between the localisation industry and the Centre’s four academic partners helps to move CNGL innovations out of the academic laboratory and into the marketplace, thereby reinforcing Ireland’s word leadership position in localisation and helping to create high-tech, high-quality employment opportunities for the future.

As a Science Foundation Ireland-funded Centre, CNGL helps link scientists and engineers in partnerships across academia and industry to address crucial research questions, foster the development of new and existing Irish-based technology companies, attract industry that could make an important contribution to Ireland and its economy, and expand educational and career opportunities in Ireland in science and engineering. In addition to funding of €16.7m from Science Foundation Ireland, CNGL has already attracted an industry partner contribution of €13.5m.
CNGL has established collaborative research links with Irish SMEs and large multinational companies, some of whom are world leaders in their respective fields. Partnerships with Symantec, IBM, Microsoft, Traslán, SpeechStorm, Alchemy, VistaTEC, Dai Nippon Printing and SDL are already helping to move CNGL innovations out of the academic laboratory and into the marketplace, thereby helping to create high-tech, high-quality employment opportunities for the future. The impact of research in localisation is particularly significant in an export-led economy such as Ireland, as localisation enables companies to introduce products to otherwise inaccessible markets.
Since its establishment in 2007, the CNGL has adopted a strong commercialisation model that has resulted in numerous invention disclosures, licensing agreements and patent applications. In addition to on-going collaboration with its industry partners, the Centre has engaged with more than 70 companies across Ireland over the last year under the Enterprise Ireland Commercial Development Manager programme. RiverSuite, a CNGL spinout opportunity, is transforming on-going CNGL research into a commercial offering that enables Fortune 500 companies to reduce costs and increase consumer satisfaction by providing superior customer care experiences. The spinout leverages cutting-edge CNGL technologies which fuse proprietary corporate databases and complementary corporate assets, with distributed data stores to deliver real-time, personalised solutions. This spinout is expected to launch in autumn 2011.

The social impact of investment in third level research is evident in the Centre also. The Rosetta Foundation, an activity spun out of CNGL, is working to relieve poverty, support healthcare, develop education and promote justice through access to information and knowledge across the languages of the world. The Rosetta Foundation supports the not-for-profit activities of the localisation and translation communities through the development and deployment of an intelligent translation and locasliation platform.
For further information, visit www.cngl.ie.