Florian and Esther discuss the language industry news of the week with a first look at the newly released 2024 Slator Language Service Provider Index (LSPI) where they unpack the key findings from over 250 LSPs on the ranking.

Leading the 2024 LSPI is Super Agency TransPerfect, who recently appointed Jin Lee as the new Co-CEO. Lee began as a project manager at the Super Agency before working through various production roles and rising through the ranks.

Slator recently launched the first edition of its Language AI Briefing, a summary of the top AI stories, language AI startups, and notable AI developments. One such story covered real-time multilingual lip-sync provider Sync Labs’ open-source which shows users how to deploy and monetize their own lip-sync applications in a couple of hours.

In M&A news, 2024 began strong with French LSP Powerling acquiring troubled WCS Group which recently filed for bankruptcy. Meanwhile, Belgium-based Jonckers and US-based Acclaro have merged, becoming a cross-Atlantic Leader LSP.

In Israel, BLEND has bought local rival Manpower Language Solutions, citing a growing global interest in the Israeli market.