Capita’s entry into the translation services market through the takeover of Applied Language Solutions (ALS) late last year (see Capita spreads into translation services with ALS buy), is another smart move by the UK’s leading BPS provider. ALS was awarded a framework agreement with the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) prior to Capita's acquisition, to provide the MoJ, HM Courts and Tribunal Service, Crown Prosecution Service, HM Prison Service and police forces across England and Wales, with interpreting and translation services. The framework is expected to deliver cost savings of £60m over 5 years, which Capita said ‘greatly reduc[es] the criminal justice sector's spend in this area’.
As is usual for Capita there are technology and process re-engineering opportunities here. ALS for instance has its own hosted machine translation (MT) software called SmartMATE, which is delivered through a portal and provides personalised translation, translation memory integration, glossary management and a multi-user editing environment for linguists and translators. This product is designed to speed up and improve the translation service process.
Translation services has big potential in many areas of the public sector, notably local government, education and health, where demand is high for accurate communications with citizens that may speak many different languages. LB Brent for example, provides translation services for some 50+ different languages, and many other large authorities face similar challenges. So introducing new ways of offering translation services, perhaps as part of a larger outsourcing deal, could really help drive out cost for these organisations.
The deal also ties in neatly with Capita’s foray into the call centre and document services markets through the recent acquisitions of Ventura, Vertex Private Sector and Right Document Solutions (see here, here and here). In this space Capita will be increasingly competing against rivals such as Xerox, which also offers translation services through a network of contractors on its call centre and document outsourcing contracts. Xerox of course, has a major document outsourcing and communications BPO deal with the DWP.
Last but not least, Capita’s recent expansion in to continental Europe through AIB’s (see here) and Zurich’s financial services business (see here), makes the case for translation services all the more pressing. ALS’ network of 17,000 translators around the world should come in handy as Capita continues its European expansion.