On January 12 and 13, 2017, the CIUTI Forum was held at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, with the theme of “Short- and long-term Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Language Professions”. Among a number of highly professional sub-forums, the one themed as “AI, Big Data and Language Collaborative Innovation” organized by Global Tone Communication Technology Co., Ltd. (GTCOM) captured much attention.

        Featured speeches were delivered by five distinguished speakers, including Youyi HUANG, Executive Vice President of Translators Association of China (TAC) and Co-chairman of Language Big Data Alliance (LBDA), Maurizio VIEZZI, President CIUTI, University of Trieste, Qunkai LIU, Director of Business Development, Alibaba Cloud Europe, François MASSION, Director of D.O.G. Dokumentation ohne Grenzen GmbH, and Marcin FEDER, Head of the Interpreter Support and Training Unit, European Parliament, Brussels. They shared views with experts and scholars from different countries on the development of the language industry in the era of AI.

Youyi HUANG, President of LBDA

        Youyi HUANG mentioned that LBDA consisted of over 150 members from colleges, universities, enterprises and research institutes, and it had been striving to build a worldwide platform for closer collaboration among its members. LBDA and CIUTI will work together to create a mechanism for promoting the collaboration among universities, research institutes and language service enterprises. In the future, the two sides will jointly build the technology sharing and application platform. In addition, Youyi HUANG also talked about the challenges facing the language service industry in the era of AI and how it could translate those challenges into opportunities. In his view, it is crucial to establish a coordination mechanism and a resource sharing platform for the collaborative development of AI, big data and language.

Maurizio VIEZZI, President CIUTI

        In his speech “A Layman’s Reflections on Technology”, Maurizio VIEZZI raised three questions: “Is technology useful? Will technology change interpreting? Is technology a threat or an opportunity?”, which provoked thoughts among the attendees at the Forum. He talked from the perspective of his line of profession and proposed a number of constructive measures through brainstorming discussions.

Qunkai LIU, Director of Business Development, Alibaba Cloud Europe

        Qunkai LIU delivered a speech titled “Real-time Transcription in the Cloud, Powered by AI Technology”, noting that thanks to the combination of cloud computing and AI, the real-time transcription technology was brought by the rapid development of the multimedia and live broadcasting industry.

François MASSION, Director of D.O.G. Dokumentation ohne Grenzen GmbH

François MASSION, in his speech on “Internet of Things, Cognitive Assistants and the Role of Language Professionals”, expressed his opinions about AI. He also mentioned that cognitive assistants and robots played a key role in the process of communications and in the collection of structured and unstructured information.

Marcin FEDER, Head of the Interpreter Support and Training Unit, European Parliament, Brussels

Marcin FEDER introduced the new technologies applied by interpreters of the European Parliament, and elaborated from the perspectives of both opportunities and challenges on the approaches to improve interpreting efficiency and quality, as well as exploring new ways to enhance interpreters’ work in the future.