TransPerfect has announced that it has achieved USD 1.23bn in revenues for the 2024 financial year, representing an increase of 3% (approximately USD 35m) compared to FY23.
The Super Agency attributed its growth to “several standout performances” in its AI consulting and data annotation division, DataForce, and double-digit growth in licensing revenue for its technology solution, GlobalLink.
The company also reported strong growth in its legal division for eDiscovery and litigation support. Phil Shawe, President and Co-CEO of TransPerfect told Slator that the growth of its Legal division was “exciting and transformational” and “one that follows in the footsteps of our language business, having cleared the $250 million mark for the first time in 2024.”
TransPerfect also reported strong growth in its contact center and BPO solutions group, TransPerfect Connect. Shawe stated that the company is “working with our BPO contact center customers to transform their businesses with AI, but more importantly, to strike the proper balance between the efficiency of automation and the human touch of live agents.”
“While we are heavily investing in technologies such as AI interpreting, synthetic voice, and sentiment analysis, our growth story in 2024 was really centered around our people. We saw tremendous growth in both revenue and headcount in the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, and even the US — and we expanded globally to France and the Philippines,” he added.
“[Translation is] facing headwinds when measured as a services line item, mainly because more and more projects are suitable for automated solutions.” — Phil Shawe, President and Co-CEO, TransPerfect
Pivot to AI and Adjacent Services
Shawe told Slator that “A common thread among these divisions was high levels of customer interest in applying technology best practices, including AI, to streamline operations. […] We expect our AI-enablement consulting to continue to outperform other areas of the business. Clients are now tasking our engineers and data scientists with solving a vast array of business problems — including those beyond translation and content creation.”
On the subject of translation, Shawe stated that it is “facing headwinds when measured as a services line item, mainly because more and more projects are suitable for automated solutions.”
“We believe strongly in cannibalizing ourselves by always bringing the latest technological advances to our customers, even when it results in a short-term decrease in top-line revenue. This requires a tremendous amount of investment in both tech R&D and consultant-level professionals — but we happily devote these resources with the goal of turning the challenge of technological obsolescence into opportunity,” he added.
2025 Expansion
TransPerfect also announced that it has secured refinancing of the company’s debt in connection with the 2018 ownership buyout and consolidation. The company confirmed the financing will be used to mitigate market uncertainties, support organic growth, and drive its M&A strategy.
This follows the company’s recent acquisition of LA-based film and TV distribution technology provider, Blu Digital Group, and media localizer SPEEECH. Shawe told Slator, “Media and Gaming are growth verticals for us in 2025, and this has motivated an increase in our M&A activity — which has in turn driven dramatic growth in our India-based headcount.”
In addition to growth in India, Shawe confirmed that the company “has recently been granted permission to open a Riyadh office by the KSA,” and expects the Middle East in general will contribute to its growth in 2025. “We also expect sizable growth from the DACH region, a motivating factor in our acquisition of Apostroph Group,” he added.
Slator 2024 Language Industry M&A and Funding Report
This 55-page report provides an in-depth analysis of mergers, acquisitions, and funding in the language services industry in 2024.
Commenting on the company’s M&A strategy, Shawe stated “While there is no doubt that AI-related technologies will change these businesses in the future, we believe that we will succeed by acquiring and growing them now. We have had great success navigating technology-driven inflection points in other industries, and we believe we will secure our future by leading technology advancement to the benefit of our customers in media and gaming.”
Technology Roadmap
In terms of its flagship product, GlobalLink, the company plans to enhance the tool with new features in 2025. These include GlobalLink Write for AI-powered content creation, GlobalLink Media for managing subtitling, dubbing, and distribution, and GlobalLink Live for AI interpreting.
Shawe told Slator, “Thematically, a big push for us in 2025 will be to offer clients more self-service options that enable them to directly manage processes like launching global websites, MT and LLM training, workflow creation, and reporting.”
The company also plans to announce developments with other technology products, namely Trial Interactive, Reef Legal Technology Suite, Sterling, Dataforce, and Paybooks. Shawe concluded: “We have extremely ambitious goals for GlobalLink and each of these product lines — and we look forward to executing on that vision in 2025 and beyond.”