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IBM language translation software makes leap

The tech giant has produced a way to get real-time, two-way translation between two languages.

By MADHUSMITA BORA, Times Staff Writer
Published February 15, 2008

You don't speak Mandarin and you lose your wallet and your way in Shanghai. Pantomime and Pictionary isn't getting you anywhere. So, what do you do?

IBM says it can rescue you.

Last year, the tech titan launched MASTOR, a software tested and produced in Florida that allows real-time, two-way communication between two people speaking different languages.

All you do is speak into a PDA or laptop in English and the gadgets talk or write back the sentences in another language.

MASTOR - which stands for "multilingual automatic speech translator" - is currently being used by U.S. troops and workers in Iraq. Last March, IBM donated 1,000 devices and 10,000 MASTOR software copies to the U.S. Department of Defense.

The gadgets and codes valued at $45-million were tested and produced in IBM's Boca Raton office. IBM, which has 1,200 employees in the Tampa Bay area, says the English-to-Arabic software is more than 90 percent accurate.

"It's a very advanced piece of technology, and we haven't sold it to anyone yet," said Yuqing Gao, manager for speech recognition and understanding at the T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y.

Gao proposed the idea of a speech-to-speech translation machine in 2000. With IBM's tentacles spread far and wide, the company felt the need for a technology to communicate with employees in different countries. The belief was as the world continues to shrink, such a system could have commercial appeal for tourists and businesses.

There are Web sites that offer limited text-to-text translation, such as babelfish.altavista.com, freetranslation.com and worldlingo.com. But IBM saw plenty of potential for real-time, voice translation.

The company supported the research in its Yorktown Heights lab, where it was initially developed. IBM at some point could license the software to PDA and laptop manufacturers. The company already has its technology supporting popular gadgets such as XBox 360, iPod, the Nintendo Wii and PlayStations.

Revolutionary move

If the human-to-machine-to-human translation works, it could revolutionize the translation industry. There are fewer than 20 commercial translation systems available globally, IBM said. And the need has never been greater.

Last year, the Pentagon was expected to spend more than $75-million on translation research. In 2006, a report stated that only 33 of 1,000 U.S. embassy staffers in Baghdad spoke Arabic. Six of them were fluent.

Initially, Gao's group built a technology that facilitates English-to-Mandarin translation, but the war in Iraq steered IBM toward Arabic. The company received undisclosed amounts in federal grants for the project, and eventually assigned 20 employees to work on it full time.

Last year, IBM CEO Samuel Palmisano announced the donation after visiting the son of an employee, who lost his feet in an explosion in Iraq. The freebie triggered a debate among analysts, who speculated that government's acceptance of the gift might make IBM's fellow defense contractors nervous.

More coming

The English-to-Arabic system recognizes more than 150,000 Arabic words and 50,000 English words. IBM plans to build similar technology for translating Spanish, Parsi and Portuguese.

"We claim it works for certain domain like medical, tourism, shopping and humanitarian efforts," Gao said.

So, would this technology make human interpreters and foreign language courses extinct?

Never, says Kevin Hendzel, spokesman for the American Translators Association.

"Machine translations are for writing letters to your aunt and not for business purposes," Hendzel said.

Companies have been developing such machines since 1948 and predicting the doom for interpreters, Hendzel said. Machines are good for translating and learning the gist of large amounts of materials, not for emergency rooms or war zones, he said.

"Language is not just about words," Hendzel said. "It's about facial expressions, accents, culture and context."

Madhusmita Bora can be reached at (813) 225-3112 or mbora@sptimes.com.

What makes the MASTOR different?

Machine translation has been around since the 1940s. What sets IBM's MASTOR apart is that it recognizes speech, translates to a different language and speaks out sentences in real time, facilitating a two-way conversation.

How does someone use it?

The software can be used with a personal computer or even a hand-held PDA to ease language barriers on the road - be it a soldier in a foreign country or a traveling tourist.

[Last modified February 14, 2008, 22:56:56]