China’s language services as an emerging industry

Languages play an essential role in China’s drive for modernization and in its interactions with the rest of the world. Discussions in this paper are designed to offer an overview of China’s language services, which have grown into a sizable industry with more than 70,000 businesses. In addition to its growth in size, the language services industry has also been a leader in introducing CAT technology in translation and adopting advanced technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence, etc. Language service providers (LSPs) have also worked with institutions of higher learning in various forms of collaboration to provide internship opportunities to students of translation and other forms of support to universities. In order to promote the healthy development of the industry, the Translators Association of China (TAC) has done a huge amount of work in organizing industry efforts to develop guidelines for different kinds of language services, and help the industry to exercise self-regulation. This paper also discusses the challenges that the industry faces today and offers recommendations to the industry as it moves forward.