When we last covered Transfluent, the translation firm was applying its technology to social media and mobile apps. That’s obviously still the case, but now the company’s moving into gaming, blogging and even customer services.
At the Slush conference in Helsinki on Wednesday, Transfluent revealed deals with game engine provider Unity and WordPress.com VIP maker Automattic. Also, on the quiet, they’ve inked agreements with Zendesk and Chinese microblogging service Weibo.
In the case of Unity, this means Transfluent’s services will be available through the Unity Asset Store. And, according to Transfluent, translations will be updated every time the developer updates the game itself. The company’s 15,000-strong freelance translation squad will also handle app store descriptions.
Weibo? Well, that’s a social media service, so no new territory there. Zendesk is a pretty big deal though.
“It’s going to be very interesting, because a lot of customers have been asking if we support Zendesk,” Tranfluent CEO Jani Penttinen told me. “Half a year ago, it wasn’t possible, but then they opened up their API.”
And for pro WordPress.com users, well, it’s pretty simple – they can serve up human-translated versions of their posts to customers in the relevant territories.
So, what kinds of deals is Tranfluent striking here?
Pettinen opened up about the two really interesting ones here, namely Unity and Zendesk. Unity’s a profit-sharing deal, apparently, while Zendesk is a far simpler matter.
“It’s an added value,” Penttinen said. “We don’t pay anything. They’re just happy we provide the service for their customers.”
Disclosure: Automattic, maker of WordPress.com, is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, GigaOm. Om Malik, founder of GigaOm, is also a venture partner at True.
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