E-mail outsourcing company USA.NET signed a deal with real-time language
translation provider e-lingo LLC to bundle e-lingo’s services
with Net@ddress, USA.NET’s consumer e-mail
service.
E-lingo will provide translated e-mail services to Net@ddress’s more than 8.1
million subscribers worldwide, giving them the ability to easily communicate
internationally.
Financial arrangements were not disclosed.
“Time and distance are no longer factors in global Internet communications,
but the age-old barriers presented by differing human languages continue to
plague this global community,” said Michael Ballard, president and CEO of
e-lingo.
“e-lingo’s alliance with USA.NET is a significant step toward
realizing the
‘one world’ promised by the Internet.”
Jupiter Communications has predicted that more
than 40 percent of Internet users will come from Asia and Europe in the year
2000.
Computer Economics has said it
expects
that the number of non-English speaking Internet users will increase by 150
percent in the next six years.
In the first quarter of 2000, USA.NET plans to offer a limited version of
e-lingo’s real-time translation solution as a free service to all Net@ddress
customers. Additionally, Net@ddress customers will be able to subscribe to an
enhanced version of the translation services for a small annual fee.
The
translated e-mail service will initially support six
languages — English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese– with
Japanese and several other languages to follow.
