Smartcat’s Series C, YouTube Dubs, Viva Translate Shuts Down

Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week, where they give their impressions from SlatorCon Silicon Valley and touch upon the findings from the 2024 ALC Industry Survey.

In a significant funding update, Esther reports that Smartcat raised USD 43m in a Series C round, bringing their total funding to USD 70m. This funding will support product innovation in AI translation and multilingual content generation.

Florian talks about YouTube’s potential launch of AI dubbing, a feature in testing that aims to generate translated audio tracks for videos, significantly enhancing content accessibility and engagement.

In Esther’s M&A corner, Cloudbreak, now rebranded as Equiti, acquired its competitor Voyce and brought on a new private equity partner, Heritage Group. Meanwhile, EasyTranslate acquired World Translation, expanding its reach in the Nordic and DACH regions.

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The duo bid farewell to publicly traded Keywords Studios, which is delisting after being acquired by private equity firm EQT. They also note the shutdown of Viva Translate, a speech-to-speech translation company that will open-source its tools as it winds down.