Download Electronics and Technology Translation: Client Stories (PDF)
Sector Introduction
Electronics and technology companies produce some of the most demanding translation work in any industry. The documents are varied: datasheets, product specifications, firmware strings, user interface text, user guides, compliance documentation, patents, packaging, and corporate communications. Each carries its own requirements for accuracy, formatting, and regulatory adherence.
The German market is particularly significant. Heads of Marketing are frequently the key decision-makers for translation procurement, and the majority of electronics clients in our portfolio sit in the 51-to-200-employee range. These are companies large enough to operate internationally but not so large that they maintain in-house translation departments. They need a partner who understands both the technical content and the commercial pressures.
Technology moves quickly. Product development cycles compress, firmware updates ship monthly, and documentation must keep pace across every target language. A datasheet that lags behind a product revision is worse than no datasheet at all. Compliance requirements add another layer: CE marking, UKCA certification, and product-specific safety standards all impose obligations on translated documentation. In regulated categories, the translated user guide is not a courtesy. It is a legal requirement.
The stakes are concrete. An incorrect datasheet misleads engineers making specification decisions, potentially causing design failures downstream. A poorly translated user interface frustrates customers and generates support tickets. Patent translation errors carry legal consequences that can invalidate intellectual property protection entirely. Packaging errors delay shipments at customs or, worse, reach consumers with incorrect safety information.
Electronics and technology represents 3.02% of Bubbles’ revenue. It is not our largest sector, and we would not claim otherwise. But the clients we work with in this space have stayed with us, in some cases for over two decades. The case studies that follow explain why. They cover confidential corporate communications, regulated product documentation, specialist terminology management, technical workflow innovation, multilingual artwork production, and flexible service models that adapt as clients grow.
What they share is a common theme: electronics translation is not simply a matter of linguistic competence. It requires an understanding of how technical companies actually work.
Case Study: Philips
Confidential corporate communications and regulated product documentation across Far-Eastern languages
Philips is a Dutch global technology company operating across healthcare, consumer lifestyle, and lighting. The company is recognised worldwide in cardiac care, acute care, and home healthcare. It is, by any measure, a substantial organisation with exacting standards.
Bubbles has worked with Philips since 2003. The relationship was established specifically to handle Far-Eastern language translations, where the specialty and diversity of languages and dialects is enormous. This is not a region where a generalist agency can simply assign a translator and hope for the best. The differences between Simplified and Traditional Chinese, the formality registers in Japanese, the technical conventions in Korean — each demands specific expertise.
The scope of work is wide. At the corporate level, Bubbles handles highly confidential announcements including quarterly results, strategic business plans, and senior management communications. These documents are market-sensitive. They require absolute discretion, rapid turnaround, and zero tolerance for error. A mistranslated figure in a quarterly results announcement is not an embarrassment. It is a compliance incident.
On the product side, the work encompasses customer-facing materials: user guides, packaging, licence agreements, and highly technical patents. Philips operates in strictly regulated industries — both electronics and healthcare — where regulatory guidelines extend explicitly to translated documents. A user guide for a cardiac monitoring device must be as precise in Mandarin as it is in Dutch or English.
The project management demands reflect this complexity. Meticulous milestone tracking is standard. Staff are available seven days a week. When Philips needs a confidential document translated for a Monday morning board meeting, the work happens over the weekend. There is no alternative.
Twenty-two years is a long time to retain a client. It is not achieved through competitive pricing alone. It is achieved by never giving a company like Philips a reason to look elsewhere.
Case Study: Zumtobel (AC/DC)
Terminology management as the foundation for specialist lighting industry translation
Zumtobel is an Austrian company specialising in lighting technology. The business covers development, production, and sales of lighting solutions, luminaires, lighting management systems, and lighting components for both indoor and outdoor applications. It is a specialist industry with specialist language.
The translation requirement is broad: website content, product information and specifications, newsletters, promotional emails, and brochures, all into numerous languages. Before working with Bubbles, Zumtobel had encountered the same problem repeatedly with other translation agencies. They could not correctly implement the technical terminology specific to the lighting industry.
This is a common frustration in specialist sectors. Generic translators produce linguistically correct text that is technically wrong. A luminaire is not a lamp. A lighting management system is not a dimmer switch. The vocabulary matters because the readers — specifiers, architects, electrical engineers — will notice immediately when it is wrong.
Bubbles addressed this by reviewing a vast quantity of Zumtobel’s approved internal material in each target language. From this review, we produced a comprehensive technical multilingual glossary containing hundreds of frequently used terms. Each term was approved by Zumtobel’s local representatives in each market. The glossary became the definitive resource for all translation work.
This was not a one-off exercise. New phrases are continuously added as Zumtobel develops new products and technologies. The glossary is a living document that grows with the client’s business.
Beyond text translation, Bubbles provides print-ready multilingual artwork. We translate and typeset material including non-Latin languages, adapting artwork to accommodate the different copy lengths that inevitably result from translation. German, famously, tends to be longer than English. Arabic reads right to left. These are not afterthoughts. They are fundamental to delivering material that a client can actually use.
The glossary solved the original problem. Everything else followed from that foundation.
Case Study: AVEVA
Technical workflow innovation that eliminated CMS copy-paste errors
AVEVA — not to be confused with Aviva — operates the AVEVA Partner Network, a global network of suppliers providing engineering and technical solutions. The project involved translating the Partner Network website from English into European and Far-Eastern languages, managed through a marketing and branding agency.
The initial brief was straightforward enough. The client wanted to provide website content in Word format for translation. This is a common request and, on the surface, a reasonable one. Word files are familiar. Everyone can open them.
Bubbles explained the problem. Translating from Word files would mean manually inserting the translated content back into the content management system. This is time-consuming under any circumstances. With non-Latin scripts — Japanese, Korean — it becomes genuinely risky. Copy-paste errors in these scripts are difficult to spot during quality checks conducted by non-readers. A misplaced character or a corrupted encoding is easily missed, and the result is gibberish on a live website.
We suggested a different approach. Rather than extracting content into Word, the English content would be exported from the CMS as HTML files. Bubbles would translate the content directly within the HTML structure, preserving all formatting tags and metadata. The translated HTML files could then be imported back into the CMS automatically, with no manual insertion required.
Trials were carried out. The approach worked seamlessly. Translation happened within the native file format of the CMS. No reformatting. No copy-paste. No risk of introducing errors during the reimplementation stage.
This is not a revolutionary technology. It is simply a willingness to understand how the client’s systems actually work and to adapt the translation workflow accordingly. Many agencies default to their own preferred process regardless of the client’s technical environment. The result is unnecessary manual work, avoidable errors, and frustrated project managers on both sides.
The AVEVA project demonstrated something we have found consistently: the most valuable contribution a translation partner can make is often not linguistic. It is procedural.
Case Study: VoCoVo
From website translation to full marketing and technical documentation
VoCoVo manufactures headsets and communication systems for retail staff. Their clients include Asda, Iceland, Dunelm, and other well-known UK retailers. The product is practical: it allows shop floor staff to communicate without leaving customers waiting or walking to the back office. After establishing a strong position in the UK market, VoCoVo decided to expand internationally.
International expansion meant non-English markets. VoCoVo turned to Bubbles.
The initial requirement was website translation. This is often how relationships with technology companies begin. The website is the most visible and most urgent piece of content when entering a new market. It needs to be right, but the volume is manageable and the risk is contained. It is, in effect, a trial.
From there, the scope grew. Brochures followed the website. Then microsites. Then blogs and articles. Then HR material for the new international offices. Each content type brought Bubbles deeper into VoCoVo’s operations and closer to the technical heart of the business.
The significant step came when VoCoVo began entrusting us with the translation of technical user guides for their equipment. This is a different proposition from marketing content. A brochure can tolerate a slightly imprecise turn of phrase. A user guide for a communication headset cannot. The instructions must be clear, accurate, and consistent with the terminology used in the product interface itself.
VoCoVo’s local offices review and approve all translated material. The feedback has been consistently positive. In fact, we have never received negative feedback on any deliverable.
This progression — website to marketing to technical — is a pattern we see regularly with technology companies. The first project is a test. Quality on that test earns the next project. Sustained quality over time earns the work that really matters. No amount of credentials or sales presentations substitutes for simply delivering accurate translations, on time, repeatedly.
Case Study: Matica Group
Multilingual artwork and DTP for payment and identity systems
Matica Group is based in Switzerland. It is a fast-growing, innovative global company that designs, manufactures, and markets payment and identity systems, including specialist ID printing equipment. The products serve markets across Europe, Latin America, and North Africa.
The translation requirement centres on technical specification documents. These are the core sales and implementation documents for Matica’s products — detailed, precise, and essential for international markets where English-language documentation is insufficient.
The relationship began with Matica’s UK operation. As with several of our technology clients, the initial engagement was limited in scope. Quality and service on that initial work led to referrals within the group. Bubbles now works with Matica’s operations in Switzerland, Italy, and the United States. Each operation has its own requirements and target languages, but the quality expectations are consistent across the group.
A particularly valuable aspect of the service is multilingual artwork production. Matica provides English-language InDesign files. Bubbles translates the content and delivers final, localised, print-ready artwork. This is not simply a matter of replacing English text with translated text. Layouts must be adjusted for copy length variations. Font choices must be verified for each script. Colour profiles and bleed settings must be maintained.
Non-Latin languages present specific challenges. Arabic, for instance, reads right to left and requires entirely different typographical conventions. Many clients — Matica included — do not have in-house designers with experience in Arabic typesetting. Attempting it without that expertise produces documents that look amateurish to the target audience, regardless of the translation quality.
By delivering complete, print-ready artwork, Bubbles removes a significant bottleneck from Matica’s international operations. The client does not need to find a local designer in each market, brief them on brand guidelines, and manage the artwork production separately from the translation. The entire process is handled as a single workflow, from English source file to final localised output.
Case Study: Masternaut (Michelin Group)
Flexible translation and proofreading across technical telematics content
Masternaut is one of Europe’s largest telematics companies, providing fleet and asset management solutions. The business encompasses vehicle tracking devices, software platforms, and consultancy services. It was featured in the UK Government’s Future 50 Tech Company list and the Sunday Times Tech Track 100 before being acquired by Michelin in 2019.
When Masternaut began expanding its European operations in 2015, it turned to Bubbles for the translation of technical material. The core documents were product guides, user instructions, and training guides — the documentation that sits between the engineering team and the end user. These documents must be technically accurate, clearly written, and consistent across every language in which Masternaut operates.
The service model adapted to Masternaut’s particular circumstances. In some markets, local representatives carried out their own translations. This is not unusual in companies with knowledgeable staff in regional offices. The risk, however, is inconsistency. A local sales manager may be fluent in the target language but unfamiliar with the conventions of technical documentation. Bubbles provided in-depth proofreading of these locally produced translations, ensuring they met the same quality standards as centrally commissioned work.
This flexibility matters. A rigid translation partner that insists on controlling every word from source to delivery is not always what the client needs. Sometimes the most useful service is reviewing and refining work that already exists, catching the errors that a non-specialist reviewer would miss, and ensuring terminological consistency across documents produced by different people in different offices.
The partnership grew as Masternaut grew. The company’s acquisition by Michelin in 2019 expanded its geographic reach and its language requirements. Bubbles’ ability to translate and proofread across all languages and all technical industries positioned us to support that expansion without requiring Masternaut to brief a new supplier or rebuild institutional knowledge from scratch.
When a client grows, it is useful to have a translation partner that can grow with it.
Patterns and Insights
Six clients across different segments of the electronics and technology sector. Different company sizes, different countries of origin, different products. Yet several patterns emerge consistently.
Terminology management is the foundation. Zumtobel’s experience is the clearest illustration, but the principle applies everywhere. Specialist technical vocabulary must be agreed, documented, and maintained. Without a controlled glossary, each translator makes independent decisions about terminology, and the result is inconsistency that undermines credibility with technical readers.
DTP and artwork capability matters. Electronics companies need print-ready multilingual output, not just translated text files. Matica, Zumtobel, and others require finished artwork that can go directly to print or to a web platform. A translation supplier that delivers a Word document and considers the job complete is solving only half the problem.
Format innovation saves time and prevents errors. The AVEVA project demonstrated this directly. Matching the translation workflow to the client’s technical environment — translating within HTML rather than forcing content through an unnecessary Word intermediary — eliminated an entire category of error. The best process is the one that fits how the client already works.
Starting with one content type and expanding is common. VoCoVo began with website translation. Matica began with a single national operation. Philips began with Far-Eastern languages specifically. In each case, the scope grew because the initial work was delivered well. Technology companies are rightly cautious about entrusting technical documentation to an unproven supplier. Earning that trust takes time and consistent performance.
Non-Latin scripts require specialist handling. Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean each demand specific typesetting expertise. This is not a minor operational detail. It is a capability that many translation agencies lack entirely, and its absence becomes apparent the moment a client needs a print-ready document in a right-to-left or character-based script.
These are not insights that emerged from theory. They emerged from doing the work, across two decades, for companies that build things.
Get in Touch
If your electronics or technology company needs translation support — whether for datasheets, user guides, compliance documentation, patents, or multilingual artwork — we are happy to discuss your requirements.
Email: info@bubblestranslation.com
Telephone: 0870 777 7750
Web: bubblestranslation.com
Bubbles Translation Services — Technology translation expertise since 2003.
