Address by Mr. Noel Treacy, T.D., Minister for Science, Technology and Commerce at the Localisation Checkpoint '99 Conference "New Media Localisation - Challenge or opportunity?" at the European Foundation for Living and Working Conditions, Loughlinstown, Co. Dublin, on Wednesday, 17th November, 1999 at 9a.m.

I am very pleased to be here today to officially open your Localisation Checkpoint '99 Conference and I wish to sincerely congratulate the Localisation Research Centre for organising this major event for the localisation industry.

This Conference is very timely in the context of the importance of the software localisation industry to Ireland which employs over 12,000 people and is a key player on the world stage.

The protection of Europe's rich linguistic and cultural heritage in the information age is both a major challenge and a real opportunity for business and politics. For European citizens, it is a prerequisite for participation in the Information Society of the next millennium. Software publishers are already responding to the demands of their European-wide customer base by supporting a wide variety of local languages and cultures in their products.

The localisation industry, initially seen as just one of many service suppliers to the general IT sector, has now established itself as a key player. The industry is translating the European challenge into new business opportunities.

The localisation industry was originally associated exclusively with software. However, over the past five years, and following developments new technologies such as the web. Synergies have been created between the IT and other industry sectors, which are dealing with similar issues to those encountered in the software localisation industry. Among, these are the aeronautics, automotive, and traditional publishing industries. Because of the ever-increasing role that IT plays in the production cycles of all of these industries, they are increasingly facing similar issues when developing products for the global market place. Issues range from the need to handle, control, and translate large amounts of text into a variety of languages within a limited amount of time, within a tight budget and according to strict quality guidelines, to the need to adapt -- not just translate -- their products to the culture and locale of the target market.

It is worth noting that IT provides the framework for the convergence of these activities and the localisation industry provides the framework for the convergence of the multilingual aspects of these activities. The industry is becoming the catalyst for the electronic multilingual production and publishing processes. Arising from these developments, the concept of localisation is being redefined as the provision of services and technologies for the management of multilinguality across the global information flow.

The growth of the Internet and the World Wide Web, particularly over the past five years, has been one of the most remarkable developments in the history of mankind. Its arrival affects everybody - the computer industry, telecommunications, the media, chipmakers, and the software world. The Internet, the emergence of new technologies and the globalisation of the economy are leading to a convergence of industries which are only beginning to realise the huge scale of the transformation which businesses will have to go through in order to survive into the next millennium.

The business of computing (hardware, software, and services), communications (telephony, cable, satellite), and content (publishing, entertainment, advertising) are converging to create the new media industry. New media publishing on the Internet is all at once computing, entertainment, broadcasting, music and video production.

Timely and cost effective delivery of high quality digital content to the global market place has become a major growth area for the localisation industry. It opened the relatively narrow software localisation industry to a wider range of players who are broadening traditional roles within the software localisation industry.

As geographical barriers to the creation of the global society become increasingly insignificant through the emergence of new technologies and the rapid growth of the Internet, language and cultural differences among the citizens of the 'global village' remain for many the last obstacle for their participation in the information society of the next millennium. The new media industry, emerging out of the decline of a number of traditional industry sectors, will need to overcome this obstacle in order to reach its full potential as the global driving force in the inclusive, multilingual information society.

The localisation industry, although relatively young, has already gained considerable experience in the linguistic and cultural adaptation of IT applications to the requirements of a wide variety of countries and cultures. The industry is ideally positioned to become the enabler for the multilingual, inclusive information society. Given the diversity of languages and cultures in Europe, web-based multimedia and contents localisation has now become one of the major growth areas for both the localisation and language industries, and presents a major opportunity for the development of human language technologies in Europe.

The Irish-based localisation industry have adapted their business strategies to respond swiftly to these changes. One noteworthy example of the action taken and the support provided by the Irish authorities to the industry in Ireland is the Localisation Research Centre (LRC), now based at the University of Limerick. It provides a focal point for a wide range of innovative activities and is helping the industry here to move up the value chain. The close collaboration between the Centre and the software localisation industry is particularly welcome.

In conclusion, I would like to wish all of you present here a stimulating and successful Conference and I look forward to announcing the winner of the 1999 LRC Best Thesis Award, sponsored by Symantec Ireland.