With the world becoming increasingly advanced, each industry is also becoming very specialised. When high technical or engineering companies want to enter into new foreign markets, they will require translation services to transform their product descriptions into the local languages. However, there are many different types of translation services in the market.

When a customer is aiming to translate a document that contains scientific terminology or specialised industrial techniques, it is best to opt for professional technical translations. Technical translation is quite different from general translation. General translation is normally carried out by the translators without any need for specialised knowledge. On the other hand, technical translations will require the translators to understand a range of technical jargon and relevant industrial knowledge, in order to produce a technically sound target language document.

Technical Translation Example

Perhaps some examples might be more helpful in illustrating the different functions which technical translations have over the general translations. When a pharmaceutical company wishes to have a description of the drug translated from English into a different language, the technical translators will take into consideration the suitable terminology used in medicine and chemistry to produce an accurate description in the target language. Since technical translations would require the translators to possess working knowledge of medicine, drugs or chemistry, they are usually doctors or chemists who are working part-time as professional translators. It is also common to find these highly skilled technical translators to be university academics (such as doctors) in bio-chemistry or medicine.

Business Technical Translations

Not everyone needs professional technical translations. However, it is frequently used by businesses in a range of industries such as:

• Mechanical and electrical engineering companies (e.g. engine specifications)

• Equipment manufacturers (e.g. user manuals)

• Medical labs and hospitals (e.g. health reports)

• Food and beverage companies (e.g. nutrition facts labels)

• Pharmaceutical companies (e.g. drug descriptions)

• Law firms (e.g. legal contracts)

• Financial institutions (e.g. accounting reports and forecasting)

All the above industries rely on accurate use of terminology where technical translations play a pivotal role in getting the right message across. Professional technical translations will help to ensure the coherency in the translated documents.

The Technical Translations Process

The technical translations process is divided into a few stages. Once a mechanical engineering company appoints a professional translation company to carry out a technical translation (e.g. from English to French), the project manager will look into the linguist database for the best suited candidate. He or she will then select a French translator who is a native French speaker and also has a qualification in mechanical engineering or working experiences in the same industry.

When the technical translation is done, the project manager will then select another French translator with the same qualification to proof-read the text. The proofreading is to ensure that the technical translation is accurate and coherent before delivering it back to the client. It is common for professional translation companies to provide quality assurance, where the technical translations can be modified to the satisfaction of the customer.

Conclusion

In order to achieve accurate translation results on a specialist document, one should always consider the use of professional technical translations services.