As we embark on a new year, we want to take time to reflect on the one we are leaving behind. 2017 has been a transformational year for us at iTi! We are excited to start a new year and before we recap, we wanted to start with the current state of the language industry.
Technology Trends
This past year we saw a tremendous rise in publicity surrounding neural machine translation (NMT). NMT models are supposed to take phrases and sentences into consideration versus standard MT which looks solely at individual words. Titans such as Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon have all been investing heavily in the research and development of NMT for their networks. We will surely hear more and more about this in 2018 so keep an eye out!
We have also seen vast improvement in the technology and adoption of remote interpreting software. These technologies connect interpreters to clients on-demand, in real-time. As technology for video remote interpreting, video-conferencing, and the ability to utilize simultaneous interpreters for webinars has improved and shown to be user-friendly, its use has begun to soar.
It’s exciting to be apart of a rapidly growing and innovative industry where we are always pushing the boundaries to the next level. Stay tuned!
Growth
Common Sense Advisory estimates the language service industry is worth $43 billion in revenue. According to GALA, the worldwide language services market grows at an annual rate of 5.52%. The projected growth rate is 6.5-7.5% annually through 2018.
Additionally, as of mid-November 2017, the US Federal Government has already awarded more funds to translation and interpretation contracts than it did for the whole of 2016. To be exact, that’s $19.5 million dollars more than was spent in 2016 and the year still has some time to go. (Slator) Clearly, this industry shows no signs of slowing down!
Career Potential
The University of California San Diego’s Extension Center for Research ranked interpreters and translators as the #1 top emerging career (that is, the linguists, interpreters and translators, not iTi ).
According to the data, interpretation and translation will skyrocket in terms of projected growth and they predict there will be 67, 985 professionals in the industry with a median hourly rate of $21.90.
Interested in jobs in our rapidly growing company & industry? Check out our available positions here!
We love working in the language industry because no day is ever the same! There is always something exciting going on & we are going to share some major milestones with you here.
A New Building!
/2017-11-22%2001.06.50%202.jpg)
After reaching (and if we’re being honest, far extending our) capacity at our beloved office on Main Street in Manchester, we finally found a perfect new location. Our new Headquarters on Williams Street East in Glastonbury, CT (pictured above) is a historic building with so much character. In June of this year, we finally moved in and our team could not be happier! We have a huge parking lot, a full kitchen, lounge area, multiple conference rooms, a training center, and room to grow.
To see more scenes from iTi HQ, be sure to follow us on Facebook & Twitter!
Awards
In May of this year, iTi’s executive team was invited to Washington DC to accept the President’s “E” Award for Export Service. The “E” Award is the highest recognition any US entity can receive for making a significant contribution to the expansion of US exports.
“The “E” Awards Committee was very impressed with iTi’s work to improve communication between US sellers and international buyers to support export growth… iTi’s achievements have undoubtedly contributed to national export expansion efforts that support the US economy and create American jobs”
In October, iTi was voted the #1 best foreign language translation provider in the Connecticut Law Tribune’s annual ‘Best Of’ survey. iTi has been an active supporter of the legal community since its inception in 1986 and is grateful for the loyalty shown by legal professionals across the state. This was our 9th year being voted #1!
Community Support
iTi became a sponsor for Jane Doe No More’s escape alive survival skills class in Connecticut. Jane Doe No More is an organization dedicated to making the prevention of sexual violence and re-victimization personal through education, awareness, advocacy and support. We are happy to support community initiatives such as this that empower and support those in need.
Expansion
We have tremendously grown our geographic footprint this past year. With a strong hold in Connecticut, we have expanded business across the northeast in states such as Massachussetts, Rhode Island, and New York. With current clients across the nation from Florida to California and Texas, we look forward to continuing to further penetrate markets outside of the northeast.
In the beginning of the year, we opened an office in Denver, CO! The office focuses on sales and marketing and is our gateway to the west. We are thrilled to be able to serve clients across the country in person.
To support this increase in business, we have increased our employee count over 50%! Our recruiting department increased our linguist database over 80% to support the growth!
Are you a linguist interested in working with us? Click here!
Company Events
We have had some great team events this year that we wanted to share as we wrap up. With a larger staff than ever, our team now enjoys 15 minute massages every 6 weeks. Everyone has optional stand-up desks with ergonomic chairs. We’ve had countless potlucks, off-site BBQ’s/dinners, and the occasional in-office happy hour when our generous interpreters bring us wine & other goodies 😉
Some pictures of this year from team iTi are below. We hope you enjoy & have a wonderful holiday season. We will see you in the new year!
What was your favorite part of 2017? Any major milestones? Tell us in the comments below!
Comments are closed here.