translate plus is the ATC’s Member of the Month

The ATC’s Member of the Month in November 2024 is translate plus, Publicis Groupe’s fully-owned language solution agency and an industry-leading language service provider bringing culturally relevant brand stories and unique creative messages to leading companies and top brands across the world.

In September 2024, translate plus took home the ATC’s prestigious New Member of the Year Award. We caught up with the team to talk about the importance of staying agile in a rapidly changing localisation landscape and the importance of a thriving team at the heart of the business.

A thriving team at the heart of the business

For translate plus, people are at the heart of the business. Headquartered in the UK and with global offices, including seven key hubs, translate plus fosters a multilingual work environment that values well-being, growth and employee satisfaction.

Picking up the ATC New Member of the Year Award, Managing Partners Umer Nizam and Adrian Metcalf celebrated the achievements of their team: “We are hugely proud of our different workplace initiatives that aim to enhance employee engagement and productivity as well as physical and mental health at work, encouraging skill development leading to career progression and professional growth.

“At the centre of our employee engagement efforts lie initiatives like the establishment and activities of our three internal committees. Formed by team members from across different departments in the company, these committees are helping us to rethink, improve and ultimately shape the company through the voice of our own people – as well as to suggest and implement improved internal processes through innovation and a people-first mindset.”

translate plus’ sustained focus on these employee engagement initiatives has yielded tangible results. In a fast-moving industry, the company has seen a significant decrease in staff attrition rates, from 22% in 2022 to 14% in 2023 – a testament to the effectiveness of encouraging their staff to grow and thrive within the business.

Innovation and AI + human collaboration

translate plus’ ISO-certified services and AI-powered language technology solutions are designed to streamline translation management processes to deliver on global brand objectives while accommodating local strategies.

Adrian Metcalf and Umer Nizam explain the company’s approach: “Since late 2022, we have led initiatives to integrate Generative AI seamlessly into our language management software and services. This approach has established us as pioneers in the domain of Generative AI translation and among our notable Gen AI roll-outs is the introduction of two new modules within our client extranet and language management software, flow plus®.”

“These modules are powered by our proprietary secure LLM technology, a creation of our parent company, Publicis Groupe. They leverage the power of Gen AI to translate documents into multiple languages, maintaining the structural integrity of the original document format. Our Gen AI offering, alongside the ability to utilise Publicis Groupe’s internal platform for the safe experimentation and application of LLM models on language projects, especially creative translation projects, underscores our dedication to leveraging the most advanced technologies to offer scalability and cost-effective solutions without compromising on quality, making us a trailblazer in the language services industry.”

A cornerstone of the company’s success is its commitment to the Gen AI/AI + Human collaboration model, with human post-editing integrated into processes, leveraging the unique strengths of both AI and human intelligence.

Resilience, growth and results

Ranked eighth in the 2024 Nimdzi 100 list of top global language service companies, translate plus has remained a resilient player in the language services industry amidst various economic, global and local market challenges.

Attributing success to employee dedication, a client-centric model, and technology innovations, translate plus’ proactive approach has been instrumental in strengthening the company’s relationships with clients, adapting to meet their evolving needs.

Since 2022, translate plus has embarked on an impressive growth journey, achieving double year-on-year growth in 2022 and 2023. These consecutive years have been celebrated as the best in the company’s history, driven by record-breaking sales performance. Another key contributor was the introduction of a new language management software, alongside the company’s continued investment in client-centric processes including stringent QA practices.

Beyond technology and a thriving team, translate plus believes in giving back to the linguistic community, participating actively in language industry associations such as the ATC and Translators without Borders (TWB), aligning with TWB’s vision of a world without language barriers.

The translate plus team was in conversation with ATC CEO Raisa McNab.