Article was co-written by Roman Civin, Laszlo Varga and Yulia Akhulkova.
Methodology
Translation management systems (TMS) are systems that feature both translation (and editing) environments and project management modules. Core components of a typical TMS include:
- Bilingual translation environment (source and target)
- Translation memory (TM)
- Termbase (TB)
- Machine translation (MT) (optional)
- Project management features
- Built-in quality assurance (QA)
You can check out more features of a modern TMS using Nimdzi’s free TMS Feature Explorer.
Based on data Nimdzi has collected around the translation management systems (TMS) market over the past decade, we have compiled the first public version of our TMS Compass. We have supplemented the data with the cumulative knowledge and experience of our experts who work with a variety of TMS products on a daily basis.
Application
The Nimdzi Compass can be used to help developers and businesses assess the potential of TMS software. For example, a developer of a new language software product could use the compass to see where their product would fit within the market. A business that is considering adopting a TMS could use this matrix to learn how mature and innovative the technology is.
Dimensions and Labels
The TMS market today features over 130 different solutions. When selecting the TMS providers to evaluate for the compass, we chose well-known and established products with which our team also has extensive hands-on experience.
As we've been tracking the market, we picked the top-13 providers of various TMS types looking at their time on the market as well as their ability to innovate.
Dimensions
- Time on the market is depicted horizontally, indicating how long the provider has been servicing the market.
- The vertical aspect reflects how innovative the product is. Does the TMS keep ahead of the curve or does it rather react to demand? Does it leverage new foundational paradigms such as AI and LLMs? Does it have progressive features like MTQE, etc? TMS ranked in the bottom half may get the job done, but if you’re expecting a tool to give you that extra boost, search in the top half.
Labels
- Phoenixes: Long-time players who have continually been able to reinvent their product.
- Survivors: The oldest players on the market.
- Trusted bets: Those who have been proving their ability to innovate for over a decade on average.
- Traditionalists: Well-established TMS brands characterized by the reactiveness of their developments.
- New visionaries: Younger, yet quite disruptive companies.
- New conformists: Newer additions to the market who follow traditional TMS behaviors.
Disclaimer: Scoring is somewhat subjective, and so are the cut-offs
In evaluating the innovation capability of TMS, we asked a range of language technology experts to rate them on a scale of one to five, and averaged the scores. While this scoring mechanism is not completely objective and may be biased by industry perceptions, it provided us with a useful means of clustering. The separators between clusters were placed with simple sophistication to highlight key insights. However, these separators are not set in stone, and borderline cases could in fact go either way within a margin of uncertainty.
Ask the experts
The aspects that are most important for a particular TMS buyer vary depending on the actual application. Talk to a Nimdzi expert to identify the specific needs of a TMS application in your organization. By carefully selecting the variables for our partners, Nimdzi creates custom assessments that result in a valuable tool for understanding the potential of the required language software.
References
- History of TMS
- TMS Feature Explorer
- Translation Management Systems
- TMS Mosaic report (2019)
- TMS Arena (2020)
- The Nimdzi Language Technology Series: TMS (2021)
- ROI of a TMS (2021)
- TMS Migration Challenges
- Exclusive SDL Language Cloud first impressions
- NMT & TMS: How Do They Work Together
The article was co-written by Roman Civin, Nimdzi's Head of Solutions. If you wish to learn more, reach out to Roman at [email protected].
This article was co-written by Nimdzi's Service Design and Business Process Consultant, Laszlo Varga. If you wish to learn more, reach out to Laszlo at [email protected].
The article was co-written by Yulia Akhulkova, Nimdzi's Technology Researcher. If you wish to learn more, reach out to Yulia at [email protected]
