Unbabel launches AI translation app, looks for fresh funding

Wednesday at 06:01 AM

Vasco Pedro, co-founder and CEO of Unbabel, on the first day of the 2023 Web Summit at the Altice Arena in Lisbon.

Miguel Reis | SOPA | Lightrocket | Getty Images

LISBON — Unbabel on Wednesday announced a translation service powered by artificial intelligence, adding another rival to a highly competitive space — with its CEO warning that humans may not be needed for translation at all in three years.

Widn.AI is Unbabel’s new product and is based on the company’s proprietary large language model (LLM) called Tower. An LLM is an AI model that underpins applications like OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Unbabel’s LLM allows AI translation in 32 languages, Vasco Pedro, the company’s CEO, told CNBC in an interview at the Web Summit in Lisbon.

“When we started in Unbabel 10 years ago, AI was not at the stage that it is now, and so we were very much focused on creating hybrid solutions that would combine AI and human,” Pedro said.

“But I think for the first time, we believe that translation is now fully in the realm of AI capabilities, and that you can do a lot of things without needing humans at all in the case of translation.”

Unbabel’s traditional product was one that combined so-called machine learning, a type of AI, to translate words, but with human editors to check the final product.

Pedro said Widn.AI will not require humans.

“I think humans still have a slight advantage in very hard use cases. But that advantage right now is so razor thin that except for really the … most difficult use cases, we believe AI is getting really there, and it’s hard for me to see right now how three years from now, you will need humans to be translating anything,” Pedro said.

Widn.AI is the latest product in an increasingly competitive market which includes Google Translate and products from German startup DeepL.

Those companies see translation as a key area in which LLMs can be used effectively and have trained models specifically to tackle various languages.

Pedro acknowledges that the revenue per translated word is going to “drastically reduce.” But he said there will be an increase in the amount of content translated which will sustain the company’s growth.

Unbabel is speaking to investors and is looking to raise between $20 million and $50 million in funding to fuel the growth and development of Widn.AI, according to Pedro.

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