How AI Can Speed Up Your Localization

Imagine a computer that learns to translate languages as well as a native human speaker.
That’s the fantastic possibility a neural machine translation opens up. This new technology uses the power of artificial intelligence (AI) to translate between languages quickly and efficiently.

Is it the next big thing that will change the localization landscape? More importantly, will it completely replace human translators?

Let’s explore AI-powered translators in detail and how they can benefit your organization.

What is Neural Machine Translation?

A neural machine translation (NMT) is the latest iteration of machine translation (MT) engines that translate phrases from one language to another without assistance from human translators.

The problem with traditional MT engines is that they often do a literal translation without taking the other words in the phrase into account. This leads to translations that might sound funny or even offensive in the target language.

NMT uses AI language-learning technology to essentially teach the software how to translate through word pairs, one from each language. These word pairs allow machine learning to pick up on word nuances and context clues. The more of these the software encounters, the better it gets at translating.

Translation engines powered by neural networks, like the Lilt Translation Engine, provide the highest quality results, close to what a human translator can produce.

How AI Language-Learning Technology Has Impacted Language Translation

Reduces Costs

One of the most significant benefits of using artificial intelligence language learning in machine translation is cost reduction since the computer does most of the work for you.

Most of the time, neural MTs are perfectly capable of producing near-accurate translations. This reduces the number of hours human translators need to work, cutting payroll dramatically. And, because neural machine translators get better and faster over time, your benefits will also increase.

Even at its worst, neural MTs produce a few minor errors that a human translator can quickly fix. The process takes much less time than having to translate all content manually.

Improves Human Translator Productivity

No matter how good or fast a human translator is, errors and inconsistencies will always be present.

A neural MT is like having an artificial intelligence teacher by your translators’ side. It can alert them to grammar or spelling errors, give recommendations, or offer feedback that a human translator can easily miss.

AI tools also help promote consistency in your translations by building a database of terminologies over time. They ensure that the same terms are used correctly across all of your translation tasks.

Ultimately, though, it’s still a human who decides on the final translation, so the output quality is assured. However, by streamlining the process, you give translators the focus they need to do what they do best – produce accurate, readable, and correct translations.

Provides Faster Translations

The power of AI in English translations becomes apparent when you see how it can speed up the localization process. As the system learns and adapts to your translations, it can give better and more accurate suggestions.

The Lilt Translate Engine, for instance, provides suggestions as the translator is working through a phrase or sentence. The translator can then accept, change, or reject the recommendation. This feature reduces the thinking time required and eliminates post-editing, speeding up the process by as much as 300% – 500%.

Allows Customized Translations

One crucial aspect of localization is that certain industries use specific terminologies or words. For example, writing legal documents requires a whole set of words and rules compared to medical records.

Generic translations usually can’t catch these nuances. However, with neural MT, teaching AI these specific word usages can improve custom translations by as much as 20%.

The Lilt Translation Engine does this automatically with each phrase you translate, allowing our neural network to learn word contexts specific to your organization.

Can AI-Language Translation Benefit Your Business?

Platforms that use machine learning can improve your localization efforts. As we’ve covered above, they can reduce your costs, improve the results, and speed up the process significantly.

But, AI translators still can’t handle your entire localization 100%. While the technology has taken leaps and bounds when it comes to quality, it still can’t match the skill, oversight, and judgment of a human translator.

Using AI translation engines to empower human translators is where the technology truly shines. And this is what the Lilt platform is all about.

Our innovative Lilt Translate Engine uses a robust and adaptive neural network to translate content faster and more accurately than ever before. At the end of the day, it’s still a tool that supports the real star of the show – human translators. By enabling them to work faster and more efficiently, Lilt ensures the best localization possible.

Ready to localize? Contact us and get started with our translation services today.