By Philip Oltermann
Publication Date: 2026-05-07 06:00:00
AI companies in Europe are at risk of losing their world-leading status in machine translation, industry officials say, after the decision of one of the continent’s leading startups to partner with Amazon’s cloud computing division raised alarms.
While companies in the EU generally lag behind the US and China in adopting AI, a small group of European companies have captured the global market for high-quality machine translation for professional use.
The biggest success story is Cologne-based DeepL, an online translator that regularly beats Google Translate in accuracy ratings. It is used by governments, courts and half of the Fortune 500 list of top-grossing U.S. companies and is reported to have had sales of $185.2 million last year. Last month, DeepL launched a live voice-to-voice translation service reminiscent of the Babel Fish device featured in Douglas Adams’ 1981 novel The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
Shortly before…
