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Companies' Alliance Boosts Media Immediacy
Rockford Register Star
August 2001

German-speaking announcer Robert Rausche reads a script from Weidenberg, Germany, as Bob Lampkin records the voiceover in Rockford, Illinois. The high-quality playback sounds as if the two worked together in one studio.

The remote recording operation is one crucial component of an alliance formed this summer by Lampkin's Fudev Music and other respected firms – JRB Productions, a Loves Park video production house, and Pacolet International Translation, Inc., of Roscoe.The goal is to strengthen each company's place in the global marketplace and combine resources to save clients money.

Pacolet International would translate scripts into any number of languages, including Dutch, French, Finnish, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, various Spanish dialects and several Asian tongues. Pacolet handles language text for voice-over talent, says Marc Stewart, company project manager, as well as training bilingual voice talent, and creating their demo CD's.

Lampkin searches for talent in his computer database or on the Internet and then records via wideband digital phone lines.

Lampkin lays down music tracks in his studio, mixes everything on CD and ships it out. Using the old method, an announcer used a studio in his or her location, had the track mastered and then sent to Fudev, which took several days.

Pacolet's Stewart is intrigued by the immediacy of Fudev's setup. "It's pretty cool," he says. "We can tap right into their studio and get things done better and faster for our customers. We also have more hands-on quality control."

An accomplished musician, Lampkin created an orchestral funk last fall for a Jeep commercial which has played on several networks, including BET. Pacolet International provides manual translations and foreign language videos for customers including Nissan, Tyco, and Vista Film and Video.

 

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Pacolet speaks business language
Beloit Daily News
May 1999

It takes more than a knowledge of a foreign language to work as an interpreter in the world of business. Julie McKee learned this lesson early in her career as a marketing communications manager for a firm.

"When they found out that I spoke Spanish, they said, 'Gee, now you can translate for us when we deal with Spanish-speaking clients,'" McKee recalled.

She declined the offer to serve as an interpreter for the firm, but she soon discovered that the translators the firm did work with knew how to speak Spanish fluently, but they didn't understand the business terms the firm was trying to relate to its clients. Therefore, the danger of misinterpretations and misunderstandings arose.

She started creating a network of interpreters who not only spoke different languages, but also understood different fields of business such as automotive, aerospace and food service.

"I learned ours was not the only company with technically inaccurate translators." McKee said.

She decided there was a need for interpreters who were knowledgeable about technical aspects of business, so she founded Pacolet International Translation six years ago.

Since founding the company in Rockford six years ago, her company has provided language services for companies such as Caterpillar, Allied Signal, Sundstrand, and Taylor Company.

Mostly, Pacolet translates documents for business clients.

Pacolet also can have interpreters on hand for meetings. McKee noted Taylor Company in South Beloit is one company that takes advantage of Pacolet's services when the company holds an international conference each year.

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Her specialty: speaking in tongues
Crain's Chicago Business
April 1997

Frustrated by her inability to find high-quality translators, Julie Johnson McKee three years ago started a firm that's become a central resource for such talent.

At Caterpillar Inc. in Peoria, sudden demand for product safety labels from the heavy equipment maker's European customers two years ago caught the company by surprise. When Cat's in-house translators couldn't handle the extra work, they turned to Ms. McKee's firm.

"Any number of people will do translations. It's another thing to do technical translations," says Gary Knapp, a Caterpillar product manager "And it's not just French and Spanish. I get labels translated into Arabic, Polish, Russian and Farsi."

Most translators specialize in two languages. Multilingual service companies like Ms. McKee's are the exception, says Walter Bacak executive director of the American Translators Association in Alexandria, VA., whose membership has grown 33% over the past four years to 6,000, reflecting the growing number of companies doing business overseas.

Opportunities in emerging markets are spurring translation demand.

Says Ron Zinsmeister, senior communication designer at Rockford-based Sunstrand Corp., a client of Pacolet: "We're already global, but we're going into new areas, and developing countries are becoming more important to us."

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