The labour of academic translation: Who generates value in the agency model?

1.Introduction

In an opinion piece, Obrecht (1959)Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. makes the case for academics who moonlight in translation to charge fees commensurate with their expertise. “Many times,” he writes,

a teacher and an engineer work together on a translation. If the engineer were doing this on a consultant basis, he would ask fifty dollars for an afternoon’s work, while the teacher, who contributed the real toil and above all the essential knowledge not possessed by the company, would scarcely dare dream of asking half that sum!(Obrecht 1959Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. , 83)

While Obrecht’s offhand references to typewriters and Sputnik make the article a charming period piece, there is much in it that is still a recognisable portrait of the translation landscape nearly seventy years on. Obrecht’s description of the devaluation of a translation-specific skillset will chime with many translators in today’s market:

The executive who charges a $ 100 per diem (plus expenses) fee for inspecting someone else’s plant [...] enraged by the suggestion that a man with a Ph.D. and long years of experience is worth at least five or six dollars an hour.(ibid.)

One key issue underlying the opinion piece is how translation suppliers generate economic value for clients: “If a firm stands to sell 600 washing machines as a result of a letter, five or ten dollars is little enough to pay” (84). This is a crucial yet under-explored aspect of the translation process. Translation Studies has paid little heed to how translation fits into the business landscape, leading to what has been termed a “Great Divide” between academics and business practitioners (Jemielity 2018Jemielity, David 2018 “Translation in Intercultural Business and Economic Environments.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Culture, edited by Sue-Ann Harding and Ovidi Carbonell Cortés, 533–557. New York: Routledge. Jemielity, David 2018 “Translation in Intercultural Business and Economic Environments.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Culture, edited by Sue-Ann Harding and Ovidi Carbonell Cortés, 533–557. New York: Routledge. , 545). This has become less true of late with the burgeoning economic and management turn in Translation Studies, driven by scholars such as Chan (2011Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2011 Information Economics and the Translation Profession. London: Lambert Academic.Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2011 Information Economics and the Translation Profession. London: Lambert Academic., 2014Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2014 “Moving up the Value Chain? The Economic Theory of Factor Price Equalization and Its Implications for the Translation Profession.” Translation Spaces 3: 151–165. Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2014 “Moving up the Value Chain? The Economic Theory of Factor Price Equalization and Its Implications for the Translation Profession.” Translation Spaces 3: 151–165. ), Moorkens (2020)Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. , Fırat (2021Fırat, Gökhan 2021 “Uberization of Translation: Impacts on Working Conditions.” The Journal of Internationalization and Localization 8 (1): 48–75. Fırat, Gökhan 2021 “Uberization of Translation: Impacts on Working Conditions.” The Journal of Internationalization and Localization 8 (1): 48–75. , 2024Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.), Mirsafian, Pirnajmuddin, and Nejadansari (2021)Mirsafian, Leila, Hossein Pirnajmuddin, and Dariush Nejadansari 2021 “Estimating Literary Translators’ Earnings Penalty: A Cultural Economics Approach to Translator Studies.” Target 33 (3): 436–463. Mirsafian, Leila, Hossein Pirnajmuddin, and Dariush Nejadansari 2021 “Estimating Literary Translators’ Earnings Penalty: A Cultural Economics Approach to Translator Studies.” Target 33 (3): 436–463. , Lambert and Walker (2022)Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. , Sandrini (2022)Sandrini, Peter 2022 “ ‘It’s the Economy, Stupid’: Discussing the Translator’s Business against the Background of a Changing Techno-Economic Landscape.” Translation Matters 4 (2): 49–62. Sandrini, Peter 2022 “ ‘It’s the Economy, Stupid’: Discussing the Translator’s Business against the Background of a Changing Techno-Economic Landscape.” Translation Matters 4 (2): 49–62. , and Walker and Lambert (2025)Walker, Callum, and Joseph Lambert eds. 2025 The Routledge Handbook of the Translation Industry. New York: Routledge. Walker, Callum, and Joseph Lambert eds. 2025 The Routledge Handbook of the Translation Industry. New York: Routledge. focusing on the economics of the translation industry and its workers. Such research has begun to paint a fuller picture of the economic, management, and labour practices experienced by translators working today.

This article seeks to contribute to the development of an economics and labour analysis of translation by introducing a business studies tool — Porter’s (1985)Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press. value chain — that has to date been little used in Translation Studies. Defining value is clearly a major debate in economics, well beyond the scope of this article, which uses Porter’s (1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., xvi) own straightforward definition of value as “what buyers are willing to pay for a product or service.”11.The value of translation can, of course, be read through numerous alternative lenses, such as social value. The article will focus on two UK-based academic translation agencies, Cadenza and Lex Academic, analysing their scope and differentiation strategies and tentatively sketching out their respective value chains. These have been selected as relatively high-profile examples of the specialist academic translation agencies founded in the last fifteen years or so. Both are traditional language service provider (LSP) agencies, open to commissions by email or via their websites and working with a pool of external translators for commissioned projects. The workflow is traditionally linear: projects are dispatched to individual translators — named, in many instances, in the resulting publications — then edited and proofed by a team of editors, in-house at Cadenza, externally at Lex Academic. There is no evidence of project splitting or collaborative or concurrent translation (Zwischenberger 2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia 2022 “Online Collaborative Translation: Its Ethical, Social, and Conceptual Conditions and Consequences.” Perspectives 30 (1): 1–18. Zwischenberger, Cornelia 2022 “Online Collaborative Translation: Its Ethical, Social, and Conceptual Conditions and Consequences.” Perspectives 30 (1): 1–18. ; Gough et al. 2023Gough, Joanna, Özlem Temizöz, Graham Hieke, and Leonardo Zilio 2023 “Concurrent Translation on Collaborative Platforms.” Translation Spaces 12 (1): 45–73. Gough, Joanna, Özlem Temizöz, Graham Hieke, and Leonardo Zilio 2023 “Concurrent Translation on Collaborative Platforms.” Translation Spaces 12 (1): 45–73. ).

While a full value chain analysis calls for workplace embeddedness, impractical in the scope of this project, both agencies have a public profile sufficient for an analysis of key aspects of their value chain activities.22.One of the challenges of value chain research is the need for company data that is difficult to acquire without being embedded in the company itself. This article has relied on public-facing data from third-party sources such as business profile aggregators, business websites, and public statements by the founders. The latter are, of course, a different data category that require a more narrative analytical framework. Current moves to overcome the ‘Great Divide’ between academia and industry are liable to make it easier to conduct full value chain analyses in future. Both have demonstrated rapid growth as part of the fast-expanding academic author services market, forging partnerships with national research showcase platforms and targeting non-native-English-speaking academics facing “publish in English or perish” conditions (Di Bitetti and Ferreras 2017Di Bitetti, Mario, and Julián Ferreras 2017 “Publish (in English) or Perish: The Effect on Citation Rate of Using Languages Other Than English in Scientific Publications.” Ambio 46 (1): 121–127. Di Bitetti, Mario, and Julián Ferreras 2017 “Publish (in English) or Perish: The Effect on Citation Rate of Using Languages Other Than English in Scientific Publications.” Ambio 46 (1): 121–127. ; Luo and Hyland 2019Luo, Na, and Ken Hyland 2019 “ ‘I Won’t Publish in Chinese Now’: Publishing, Translation and the Non-English Speaking Academic.” Journal of English for Academic Purposes 39: 37–47. Luo, Na, and Ken Hyland 2019 “ ‘I Won’t Publish in Chinese Now’: Publishing, Translation and the Non-English Speaking Academic.” Journal of English for Academic Purposes 39: 37–47. ). They also raise interesting questions of how screening and signalling function in labour platforms that self-define as high-end boutique agencies serving a specialist clientele (Fırat and Şahin 2025Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). , 301).

2.The value chain

Porter (1985)Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press. developed the concept of the value chain in a book that has proven hugely influential, standing at 74 534 citations on Google Scholar as of August 2026.33.For an accessible example of how Porter’s value chain is used today, see Stobierski (2020)Stobierski, Tim 2020 “What Is a Value Chain Analysis? Three Steps.” Harvard Business School (blog). https://​online​.hbs​.edu​/blog​/post​/what​-is​-value​-chain​-analysisStobierski, Tim 2020 “What Is a Value Chain Analysis? Three Steps.” Harvard Business School (blog). https://​online​.hbs​.edu​/blog​/post​/what​-is​-value​-chain​-analysis, who describes three steps: identifying value chain activities, determining the value and cost for each activity, and identifying opportunities for competitive advantage. The model is used extremely widely within business studies; see, for example, Dent and Collins (2021)Dent, Benjamin, and Ray Collins 2021 A Manual for Agribusiness Value Chain Analysis in Developing Countries. Wallingford: CAB International. Dent, Benjamin, and Ray Collins 2021 A Manual for Agribusiness Value Chain Analysis in Developing Countries. Wallingford: CAB International. for an application with case studies in the agribusiness sector. In simple terms, the value chain “divides a firm into the discrete activities it performs in designing, producing, marketing, and distributing its product” (Porter 1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 26), as outlined in Figure 1. For instance, procuring raw coffee beans, roasting, grinding, packaging and transporting the ground coffee, adding flavourings, and selling the product to consumers are various possible steps in the value chain of a coffee supplier. Porter’s model is designed to enable analysis of all the processes undertaken by a given company, identifying the steps that generate the most surplus value and thereby build competitive advantage.

The value chain has made brief appearances in Translation Studies research (Petersen 1996Petersen, Margrethe 1996 “Translation and Quality Management: Some Implications for the Theory, Practice and Teaching of Translation.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 16: 201–220.Petersen, Margrethe 1996 “Translation and Quality Management: Some Implications for the Theory, Practice and Teaching of Translation.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 16: 201–220.; Chan 2014Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2014 “Moving up the Value Chain? The Economic Theory of Factor Price Equalization and Its Implications for the Translation Profession.” Translation Spaces 3: 151–165. Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2014 “Moving up the Value Chain? The Economic Theory of Factor Price Equalization and Its Implications for the Translation Profession.” Translation Spaces 3: 151–165. ; Garcia 2017Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70.Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70.), though little sustained analysis has been carried out. Garcia (2017)Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70.Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70. proposes a succinct value chain analysis of three modes of translatorial labour and the surplus value they each generate:

Off-grid translators simply deliver a target text. CAT-enabled translators deliver a target text plus reusable language data in the form of bilingual language databases that permit subsequent leveraging and discounting by clients for exact and fuzzy matches. Cloud translators deliver the target text plus the language data plus metadata — of great enterprise value because it allows managers to profile translators by productivity (speed and time), and by quality (from edits made at revision stage, or from feedback by clients or end-users).(Garcia 2017Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70.Garcia, Ignacio 2017 “Translating in the Cloud Age: Online Marketplaces.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 56: 59–70., 66)

Perhaps unsurprisingly, value chain analysis has been applied more systematically to the translation sector in industry-facing sources (Harabi 2007Harabi, Najib ed. 2007 Performance of the Arabic Book Translation Industry in Selected Arab Countries: Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Syria. MPRA Paper No. 6707. https://​mpra​.ub​.uni​-muenchen​.de​/6707/Harabi, Najib ed. 2007 Performance of the Arabic Book Translation Industry in Selected Arab Countries: Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Syria. MPRA Paper No. 6707. https://​mpra​.ub​.uni​-muenchen​.de​/6707/; Byrne 2024Byrne, Tracey 2024 “Re-Imagining Translation Productivity: Unleashing the Power of AI and LLMs.” PowerPoint presentation, Charted Institute of Linguistics Translators Day 2024. Accessed January 27, 2025. https://​www​.ciol​.org​.uk​/ciol​-translators​-day​-2024​-presentationsByrne, Tracey 2024 “Re-Imagining Translation Productivity: Unleashing the Power of AI and LLMs.” PowerPoint presentation, Charted Institute of Linguistics Translators Day 2024. Accessed January 27, 2025. https://​www​.ciol​.org​.uk​/ciol​-translators​-day​-2024​-presentations). The lack of crossover with academic research can be attributed to a lack of recognition of the importance of interlingual translation within international business research (Westney et al. 2022Westney, D. Eleanor, Rebecca Piekkari, Kaisa Koskinen, and Susanne Tietze 2022 “Crossing Borders and Boundaries: Translation Ecosystems in International Business.” International Business Review 31: 1–12. Westney, D. Eleanor, Rebecca Piekkari, Kaisa Koskinen, and Susanne Tietze 2022 “Crossing Borders and Boundaries: Translation Ecosystems in International Business.” International Business Review 31: 1–12. , 1) and by the sheer cost of market research reports conducting thorough value chain analysis, typically several thousand euros, which is far beyond the reach of individual scholars or even university library budgets.

As shown in Figure 1, Porter’s (1985)Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press. model splits all activities conducted by a business into primary and support activities. The former contribute directly to the creation of a product or execution of a service, while the latter help the former run efficiently. Value chain analysis involves identifying how each step builds value for the final product or service, opening the way to competitive advantage by reducing costs or creating product differentiation. Steps that fail to build adequate value are then liable to be removed from the process, either dropped entirely or conducted externally. Samuelsson-Brown (2006Samuelsson-Brown, Geoffrey 2006 Managing Translation Services. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Samuelsson-Brown, Geoffrey 2006 Managing Translation Services. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. , 40) offers a useful summary of a potential translation value chain, covering as primary activities:

• inbound logistics (job receipt, registration, pricing, document management)

• operations (translation, checking, proofreading, DTP, project and terminology management)

• outbound logistics (delivery, email, document management, archiving)

• marketing and sales (competitor analysis, STEP analysis, strategic alliances)

• service (terminology and translation memory management, job analysis for future customer benefits)

and, as secondary activities:

• organisational structure (management, planning, finance)

• human resources management (recruitment, training, development)

• technological development (products and processes)

• procurement (freelance translations, goods, and other services).

A full analysis of all these steps is beyond the scope of this article: it is hoped that presenting the model will prompt embedded value chain research along the lines of workplace translation process research (Ehrensberger-Dow et al. 2017Ehrensberger-Dow, Maureen, Andrea Hunziker Heeb, Peter Jud, and Erik Angelone 2017 “Insights from Translation Process Research in the Workplace.” In Doing Applied Linguistics: Enabling Transdisciplinary Communication, edited by Daniel Perrin and Ulla Kleinberger, 116–123. Berlin: De Gruyter. Ehrensberger-Dow, Maureen, Andrea Hunziker Heeb, Peter Jud, and Erik Angelone 2017 “Insights from Translation Process Research in the Workplace.” In Doing Applied Linguistics: Enabling Transdisciplinary Communication, edited by Daniel Perrin and Ulla Kleinberger, 116–123. Berlin: De Gruyter. ). However, it is worth pointing out that Samuelsson-Brown’s list includes translation as one of its core primary operations. The term ‘translation agency’ may indeed lead the casual observer to assume that translation is the core value-generating labour process of such enterprises: as Fırat and Şahin (2025Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). , 296) note, “traditional translation agencies generate revenue from translation project fees.” However, this assumption may be open to challenge on several grounds. Hébert-Malloch (2004)Hébert-Malloch, Louise 2004 “What Do We Know About a Translator’s Day?” Meta 49 (4): 973–979. Hébert-Malloch, Louise 2004 “What Do We Know About a Translator’s Day?” Meta 49 (4): 973–979. and Stelmach (2000, cited in Kuznik and Verd 2010Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43.Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43., 31) find that translation makes up well under half the labour time of in-house personnel working at translation bureaus and agencies. As Davico (2005Davico, Gianni 2005 L’industria della traduzione: Realtà en prospettive del mercato italiano [The translation industry: Current situation and prospects for the Italian market]. Turin: Edizioni SEB 27.Davico, Gianni 2005 L’industria della traduzione: Realtà en prospettive del mercato italiano [The translation industry: Current situation and prospects for the Italian market]. Turin: Edizioni SEB 27., cited in Kuznik and Verd 2010Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43.Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43., 41) points out, by definition, agencies do not subcontract management functions, as these are central to their business model. Fırat and Şahin (2025Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). , 296–297) further point out that the platform model leverages multiple other monetisation strategies, such as licensing fees and sales of data. Notably, the tasks central to Gouadec’s (2005Gouadec, Daniel 2005 “Modélisation du Processus d’Exécution des Traductions [Modelising the translation workflow].” Meta 50 (2): 643–655. Gouadec, Daniel 2005 “Modélisation du Processus d’Exécution des Traductions [Modelising the translation workflow].” Meta 50 (2): 643–655. , 2007Gouadec, Daniel 2007 Translation as a Profession. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Gouadec, Daniel 2007 Translation as a Profession. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. ) translation service provision model are frequently outsourced — often to the financial detriment of translators, as demonstrated by Fırat (2024)Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey. in his detailed study of gig translators hiring out their labour via digital platforms. In such platforms, functions that in traditional agencies would be classified as secondary in Porter’s (1985)Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press. model, such as procurement and HR, are in fact primary functions, with translation as a bought-in input.

This article therefore explores what we can deduce from publicly available sources about the value chain in the two academic translation agencies under discussion. By exploring which steps of translation production are conducted in-house as value generators and which are handled by external contractors, the article aims to identify the competitive advantage strategies implemented by both agencies in their public-facing content. It further draws on productivity data and publicly available data on relative rates of remuneration for the various participants in the chain of production to attempt to determine which aspect(s) of the textual production process the agency considers as generating most value in the finished translation.

3.The rise of a specialist academic translation market

Academic translation (i.e., the translation of academic articles, monographs, and related content such as research proposals and funding bids) has been overlooked in economic approaches to translation, despite its significance as a driver of international knowledge exchange and a form of soft power supported by state institutions (Schögler 2019Schögler, Rafael 2019 Circulation of Academic Thought: Rethinking Translation in the Academic Field. Berlin: Peter Lang. Schögler, Rafael 2019 Circulation of Academic Thought: Rethinking Translation in the Academic Field. Berlin: Peter Lang. , 2023Schögler, Rafael 2023 Die Politik der Buchübersetzung: Entwicklungslinien in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften seit 1945 [The politics of book translation: Lines of development in the humanities and social sciences since 1945]. Frankfurt: Campus. Schögler, Rafael 2023 Die Politik der Buchübersetzung: Entwicklungslinien in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften seit 1945 [The politics of book translation: Lines of development in the humanities and social sciences since 1945]. Frankfurt: Campus. ). Historically, the field was weakly structured, with translators tending to work on a relatively informal, non-professional basis: typical scenarios would be a scholar translating content relating to their research interest or a PhD student or postdoc taking on translation duties for their supervisor and research group (Chatzis et al. 2017Chatzis, Konstantinos, Thomas Morel, Thomas Preveraud, and Norbert Verdier 2017 “Traduire des mathématiques ‘pour et par des élèves’ dans la première moitié du XIXe siècle: Acteurs et pratiques de traduction à travers trois cas d’étude en Europe et aux États-Unis [Translating mathematics ‘for and with pupils’ in the first half of the 19th century: Translation stakeholders and practices in three case studies in Europe and the United States].” Mémoires du Livre / Studies in Book Culture 9 (1). https://​id​.erudit​.org​/iderudit​/1043118ar Chatzis, Konstantinos, Thomas Morel, Thomas Preveraud, and Norbert Verdier 2017 “Traduire des mathématiques ‘pour et par des élèves’ dans la première moitié du XIXe siècle: Acteurs et pratiques de traduction à travers trois cas d’étude en Europe et aux États-Unis [Translating mathematics ‘for and with pupils’ in the first half of the 19th century: Translation stakeholders and practices in three case studies in Europe and the United States].” Mémoires du Livre / Studies in Book Culture 9 (1). https://​id​.erudit​.org​/iderudit​/1043118ar ). This is still largely true. However, the advent of the internet has structured the field to some degree, facilitating the emergence of specialist academic translators who have built full-time professional careers in this area, often as an alternative to post-PhD academic employment (Throssell et al. 2020Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54.Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54.; Burlat 2022Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.). At the same time, the internationalisation of research and increasing pressure to publish in English has further structured the field of academic translation by creating regular pipelines of content for translation, especially in some language pairs. In the case of academic translation from French, a report issued by the French Ministry of Research in 2012 recommended increased financial support for the sector (Lévy-Rosenwald 2012Lévy-Rosenwald, Marianne 2012 L’édition en sciences humaines et sociales [Publishing in the humanities and social sciences]. Paris: Centre national du Livre.Lévy-Rosenwald, Marianne 2012 L’édition en sciences humaines et sociales [Publishing in the humanities and social sciences]. Paris: Centre national du Livre.). This led to a rapid expansion of the translation of French humanities scholarship, with the online research publication platform Cairn.Info hosting 5140 articles in translation (principally into English) by 2017 and 11 511 by 2021 (Cairn.Info 2022aCairn.Info 2022a Rapport d’activité Juin 2022 [Activity report, June 2022]. Accessed March 30, 2026. https://​shs​.cairn​.info​/docs​/cairn​-rapport​-d​-activite​-juin​-2022​.pdf​?lang​=frCairn.Info 2022a Rapport d’activité Juin 2022 [Activity report, June 2022]. Accessed March 30, 2026. https://​shs​.cairn​.info​/docs​/cairn​-rapport​-d​-activite​-juin​-2022​.pdf​?lang​=fr, 15).44.The figure for 2017 is all English; the figure for 2021 includes English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Cairn.Info does not disaggregate the target languages, but the accompanying graph makes it clear the latter two languages account for under 10%, with the English rate almost doubling in five years. This rapid growth exceeded the fragmented labour capacity of the small number of specialist individual practitioners acting as sole traders in 2012.

4.The advent of specialist academic translation agencies in the 2010s

The early 2010s onwards saw a small flurry of specialist agencies launched in response to this increased demand, including Cadenza Academic, launched in 2012; Academic Language Experts, launched in 2014;55.Academic Language Experts is an Israel-based business. As the key publicly available documents relating to the agency creation and structure are in Hebrew, the agency is not considered in the analysis below. and Lex Academic, launched in 2021. These agencies hire the labour power of individual translators, generating value from a percentage of their labour in an aggregate that far surpasses the value generated by individual translators on their own account. This scaling up of translation capacity in response to increased demand let the two agencies chosen for analysis expand fast. Cadenza Academic’s turnover quadrupled within a year, from an estimated £44 500 in its first year of operation to £177 300 a year later (Pomanda n.d.Pomanda n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations Ltd.” Accessed January 25, 2025. https://​pomanda​.com​/company​/08220526​/cadenza​-academic​-translations​-ltdPomanda n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations Ltd.” Accessed January 25, 2025. https://​pomanda​.com​/company​/08220526​/cadenza​-academic​-translations​-ltd); its turnover is currently estimated at £291 900. Lex Academic has demonstrated similar growth. Founder Louise Chapman has spoken about her experience moving from freelance copy-editing as a sole trader to scaling up to become a labour hub during the Covid pandemic (Quested 2021Quested, Tony 2021 “Lex Academic: A Success in Any Language.” Business Weekly, October 6, 2021. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/lex​-academic​-a​-success​-in​-any​-languageQuested, Tony 2021 “Lex Academic: A Success in Any Language.” Business Weekly, October 6, 2021. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/lex​-academic​-a​-success​-in​-any​-language; Willbold 2023Willbold, Manuela 2023 “Interview with Louise Chapman, CEO of Lex Academic & Founder of lexacademic.science: The Importance and Benefits of Editorial Services for Scientific Researchers.” London Business News, March 22, 2003. https://​www​.londonbusinessnews​.com​/ceo​-of​-lexacademic​-and​-founder​-of​-lexacademic​-science​-entrepreneur​-interview/Willbold, Manuela 2023 “Interview with Louise Chapman, CEO of Lex Academic & Founder of lexacademic.science: The Importance and Benefits of Editorial Services for Scientific Researchers.” London Business News, March 22, 2003. https://​www​.londonbusinessnews​.com​/ceo​-of​-lexacademic​-and​-founder​-of​-lexacademic​-science​-entrepreneur​-interview/). This move let her take advantage of significant economies of scale, defined by Porter (1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 70–71) as “the ability to perform activities differently and more efficiently at larger volume [or] the ability to amortize the cost of intangibles such as advertising and R&D over a greater sales volume.”

Agencies can make economies of scale in, for example, the client prospection phase: by becoming preferred trading partners for universities, they achieve a steady pipeline of work that offers a cost advantage in terms of marketing. Chapman’s company has become a listed translation service provider for universities worldwide. The business experienced extremely strong growth, attracting private investment to reach new markets. In 2021, the business had a gross profit margin of 75% (Quested 2021Quested, Tony 2021 “Lex Academic: A Success in Any Language.” Business Weekly, October 6, 2021. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/lex​-academic​-a​-success​-in​-any​-languageQuested, Tony 2021 “Lex Academic: A Success in Any Language.” Business Weekly, October 6, 2021. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/lex​-academic​-a​-success​-in​-any​-language), though its net margin has subsequently reduced as the business has expanded and increased expenditure on personnel (Chapman 2022Chapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-eliteChapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-elite).

5.Generating competitive advantage in academic translation agencies: Scope and differentiation

The value chain “disaggregates a firm into its strategically relevant activities in order to understand the behavior of costs and the existing and potential sources of differentiation” (Porter 1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 33). The aim is to identify potential sources of competitive advantage at each step of the production process, outperforming business rivals on strategic activities, generally on grounds of cost or quality. While a full value chain analysis for the two agencies is beyond the scope of this article, some key strategies can be identified from their public-facing discourse in the form of websites and business interviews.

Porter identifies three basic strategies to achieve competitive advantage — cost leadership (i.e., competing on price), focus (scope), and differentiation. Cost leadership is not a strategy espoused by either agency. Chapman (2022)Chapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-eliteChapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-elite has overtly eschewed cost leadership for Lex Academic, telling a business journal that “there’s no point trying to compete on price with another service, because that competition can only end with the provision of inferior services, dissatisfied clients, and underpaid editors.” Less information is available on Cadenza Academic’s cost leadership strategy, but their website makes no reference to competing on price. Scope and differentiation are, however, present in the public-facing profile of both agencies.

Competitive scope comprises four subtypes in Porter’s (1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 53–54) model:

• segment scope (variety of products and buyers)

• vertical scope (extent of in-house vs. externalised activities)

• geographic scope

• industry scope (presence in a range of related industries).

The two agencies clearly diverge in terms of competitive scope. Cadenza Academic deliberately maintains a narrow segment and industry scope, foregrounding translation in the arts, humanities, and social sciences as its core activity and pointing to its “devotion to our specialist fields and [...] unwillingness to translate anything else” (Cadenza Academic n.d.Cadenza Academic n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.cadenza​-academictranslations​.comCadenza Academic n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.cadenza​-academictranslations​.com). Its main buyers are institutional partners, including its significant contract with French research publications platform Cairn.Info.66.When Cairn.Info launched its translation programme in 2012, it entered into negotiations with individual translators, including the author of this article. However, it soon became apparent that the scope of the project would be better served by an agency, and a contract was signed with Cadenza Academic. See Burlat (2022Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales., 41) for a discussion of how such agencies were able to identify and leverage structural holes in the academic translation market. It outsources the translation stage to a fairly stable pool of freelance translators, with a small in-house team of academic editors. It also has a clear geographical focus, offering seven European and two Asian languages. Lex Academic differs in terms of segment and industry scope. It works with universities as a preferred supplier and with individual academics; it also offers a range of academic author services, including indexing, image rights, and publishing support, across the humanities and STEM sectors. Its geographic scope is comparable and, although its list of European languages does not map wholly onto Cadenza’s, it further offers Latin and Ancient Greek. It has narrower vertical scope, outsourcing both translation and editing to freelancers.

Cadenza’s narrow segment, and geographic and industry scope can be a double-edged sword. Given the challenges currently facing the academic translation sector as budget cuts drive scholars to turn to neural machine translation (NMT) and generative AI translation (Burlat 2024Burlat, Lison 2024 “Traduire pour des revues de sciences sociales [Translating for social science journals].” Traduire 250: 49–61. Burlat, Lison 2024 “Traduire pour des revues de sciences sociales [Translating for social science journals].” Traduire 250: 49–61. ; Throssell and Elbaz 2025Throssell, Katharine, and Pascale Elbaz 2025 La recherche “deepLisée” ou pourquoi il faut se méfier de la traduction automatique / De la traduction à la post-édition [“DeepLised” research or why machine translation is unreliable / From translation to post-editing]. Paris: AOC.Throssell, Katharine, and Pascale Elbaz 2025 La recherche “deepLisée” ou pourquoi il faut se méfier de la traduction automatique / De la traduction à la post-édition [“DeepLised” research or why machine translation is unreliable / From translation to post-editing]. Paris: AOC.), Lex Academic’s broader scope on all but the vertical aspects would seem to offer a competitive advantage. Indeed, according to the company information platform Pomanda (n.d.)Pomanda n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations Ltd.” Accessed January 25, 2025. https://​pomanda​.com​/company​/08220526​/cadenza​-academic​-translations​-ltdPomanda n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations Ltd.” Accessed January 25, 2025. https://​pomanda​.com​/company​/08220526​/cadenza​-academic​-translations​-ltd, Cadenza’s estimated 2023 turnover is considerably lower than Lex Academic’s was in 2021.

The two agencies also use different differentiation strategies. This means selecting “one or more attributes that many buyers in an industry perceive as important, and uniquely position[ing] itself to meet those needs” (Porter 1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 14). Both clearly set out to appeal to the premium market, posited to “[allow] skilled human translators to command higher prices for quality-focused work” (Bowker 2020Bowker, Lynne 2020 “Translation Technology and Ethics.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Ethics, edited by Kaisa Koskinen and Nike Pokorn, 262–278. Abingdon: Routledge. Bowker, Lynne 2020 “Translation Technology and Ethics.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Ethics, edited by Kaisa Koskinen and Nike Pokorn, 262–278. Abingdon: Routledge. , cited in Lambert and Walker 2022Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. , 284). The aesthetics of Cadenza’s website are designed to appeal to a humanities audience, describing its service as “From Aristotle to Zeno, from anthropology to Zoroastrianism.” This presumably aims to foster a sense of intellectual kinship with the academics the agency works with. Lex Academic takes a different tack, pointing out how it differs from non-specialist translation agencies, stating that “most generic translators are not well-versed in the conventions of particular academic disciplines. What makes us unique is that our translators are also subject experts in their own right” (Lex Academic n.d.Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/). The differences in differentiation strategy are foregrounded in their starkly contrasting descriptions of the editing process. Cadenza, in the “What We Do” section of its website, describes it in lyrical terms that presents agency founder Mark Mellor as an intellectual peer for humanities academics:

What survives is the argument in all its cogency and integrity. And its truth now animates another being: a new living text. This wresting of the truth from a language and binding it within another is arduous; a translator may turn aside too soon, overlooking imperfections in the body of this vibrant new creature. But the editor’s gaze must not waver.(Cadenza Academic n.d.Cadenza Academic n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.cadenza​-academictranslations​.comCadenza Academic n.d. “Cadenza Academic Translations.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.cadenza​-academictranslations​.com)

Lex Academic, conversely, frames itself, in the “Services” section of its website, as a high-end business service for ambitious scholars:

We are the proclaimed ‘secret weapon’ of hundreds of published academics. Our confidential author service promises to transform your manuscript into submission-worthy English. We are purveyors of extraordinary English proofreading, copy-editing, indexing, and translation in the humanities, social sciences, and STEM.

Whether you are after an exhaustive index, a reassuring proofread, or perhaps a more interventionist copy-edit, Lex Academic’s bespoke menu of editorial offerings are proven to make an impression with academic journals and major publishers alike.(Lex Academic n.d.Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/)

Both agencies seek to reassure buyers in terms of translation quality. Cadenza foregrounds three criteria for excellence: native speaker status, level of education (according to the website, most of its translators have a PhD), and a specific qualification in translation. Lex Academic places the emphasis squarely on source language and subject-area competence, describing its translators, in the “Translation” section of its website, as PhD-educated subject experts and the service itself as “translation for researchers, by researchers” (Lex Academic n.d.Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/; emphasis in the original). Interestingly, the clear majority of translators I have been able to identify who work for either agency have been recruited at MA or, in one case, BA level.77.This finding is based on translators working for either agency listed on the Cairn.Info platform, on LinkedIn, and, in one instance, a recent BA graduate who passed on a job request via a private email list for translators. It is fair to point out that there may be more PhD-educated translators working for both agencies that I have been unable to identify. This is an unexpectedly low barrier to entry that may be due to the Uberisation (Fırat 2021Fırat, Gökhan 2021 “Uberization of Translation: Impacts on Working Conditions.” The Journal of Internationalization and Localization 8 (1): 48–75. Fırat, Gökhan 2021 “Uberization of Translation: Impacts on Working Conditions.” The Journal of Internationalization and Localization 8 (1): 48–75. , 2024Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.) of translatorial labour inherent in the agency model. This suggests that the procurement and HR functions (i.e., keeping translator costs down by hiring at a relatively low level of experience) are a key element of the agency value chain.

Both agencies foreground translator expertise as a guarantee of quality and as a market differentiator. This might seem at odds with the translator recruitment observed in practice, particularly in the light of the claim in Fırat and Şahin (2025Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). Fırat, Gökhan, and Mehmet Şahin 2025 “Platform Economy Models in the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 290–306). , 301) that low entry barriers to platform work are an important factor affecting translation quality. The emphasis on subject-area expertise as a value-generating differentiator from non-specialist agencies does seem to be somewhat belied by translator recruitment practices that seem broadly commensurate with the profile of professional freelance translators as a whole: in other words, the agency signalling mechanisms do not entirely reflect their screening practices (Hanson, Mellinger, and Walker 2025Hanson, Thomas, Christopher Mellinger, and Callum Walker 2025 “Economic Perspectives on the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 267–290). Hanson, Thomas, Christopher Mellinger, and Callum Walker 2025 “Economic Perspectives on the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 267–290). , 281).88.Penet (2025Penet, J. C. 2025 “Freelance Translation.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 43–58). Penet, J. C. 2025 “Freelance Translation.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 43–58). , 45) points out that most freelance translators are highly educated and qualified, with just over half of freelancers surveyed holding a postgraduate qualification in 2020. It may be the case that the two agencies are overstating the translatorial skill set as a market differentiator.

6.Towards a value chain for academic translation agencies

As the concept of translaboration (Zwischenberger and Alfer 2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. ) makes clear, translation is typically a collaborative process. The translator may be “canonically treated as an individual” (Kuznik and Verd 2010Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43.Kuznik, Anna, and Joan Miquel Verd 2010 “Investigating Real Work Situations in Translation Agencies: Work Content and Its Components.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 44: 25–43., 28), but in terms of the textual production process, they are merely one link in a chain, as established as far back as Holz-Mänttäri (1984)Holz-Mänttäri, Justa 1984 Translatorisches Handeln: Theorie und Methode [Translatorial action: Theory and methods]. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia.Holz-Mänttäri, Justa 1984 Translatorisches Handeln: Theorie und Methode [Translatorial action: Theory and methods]. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia..

The question then is: Which steps in the textual production process generate value for agencies and which actors contribute the key value-generating competences? As seen above, the process of language transfer is externalised to freelance translators. Agencies keep in-house staff numbers small to lower overheads: the language transfer process is a bottleneck for the translation workflow and is therefore outsourced to freelance workers for maximum flexibility.

New technologies have not permitted significant productivity gains in terms of the academic research articles that are the core business of the agencies in question.99.The pattern of productivity in such agencies is distinct from the similar ecosystem of ‘knowledge translation’ (e.g., translation of reports for major international organizations, which do use CAT tools and have therefore seen a sharp rise in productivity in recent decades). This is a sector where CAT tools are little used, because texts typically feature low repeatability. Evidence of translator productivity from the early nineteenth century points to outputs comparable with those expected of translators today (Pickford 2025Pickford, Susan 2025 Professional Translators in Nineteenth-Century France. New York: Routledge. Pickford, Susan 2025 Professional Translators in Nineteenth-Century France. New York: Routledge. ). Full-time academic translator Lucy Garnier averages 10 000 words in four days (Throssell et al. 2020Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54.Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54., 45). Cadenza expects its outsourced translators to generate around 1500 to 2000 words a day (Cadenza Academic 2022Cadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAkCadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAk, 00:38:20). As a rough calculation, the approximately 130 articles a year translated into English for the Cairn.Info platform from 2020 to 2022 (Cairn.Info 2022bCairn.Info 2022b Projet “Cairn International”: Favoriser le Rayonnement International des Revues de Sciences Humaines et Sociales en Langue Française. Bilan 2020–2022 & Perspectives 2023 [The “Cairn International” project: Raising the international profile of French-language human and social science journals. Results 2020–2022 and perspectives for 2023]. Paris: Cairn.Info.Cairn.Info 2022b Projet “Cairn International”: Favoriser le Rayonnement International des Revues de Sciences Humaines et Sociales en Langue Française. Bilan 2020–2022 & Perspectives 2023 [The “Cairn International” project: Raising the international profile of French-language human and social science journals. Results 2020–2022 and perspectives for 2023]. Paris: Cairn.Info., 5) therefore represent around three years’ work for an individual translator working full-time at Garnier’s productivity levels, roughly a third more for the Cadenza freelancers.1010.This represents a significant scaling back from the Cairn.Info project’s initial 2012 plan of translating some 300 articles a year, confirmed to me in private correspondence by project manager Delphine Maine (23 March 2023). Bringing the whole translation process in-house would therefore require the creation of around three or four full-time positions, adding an extra 50% to the current staffing levels that top out at seven for Cadenza and eight for Lex. Given that “each activity in the value chain involves [...] operating costs” (Porter 1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 64), it can safely be assumed that the margin generated by the language transfer process is insufficient to outweigh the operating costs (salary and other overheads associated with a larger workforce) associated with bringing this step in-house. In other words, the potential benefits of integrating this step into the value chain (Porter 1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 79) do not justify the additional overheads involved. Do Carmo (2020)Do Carmo, Felix 2020 “ ‘Time Is Money’ and the Value of Translation.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 35–57. Do Carmo, Felix 2020 “ ‘Time Is Money’ and the Value of Translation.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 35–57. reaches a similar conclusion:

The fact that most translation work is outsourced is an indication that its perceived market and growth value is low. In other words, the intrinsic value of translation time is not worth the investment in in-house skills acquisition.(Do Carmo 2020Do Carmo, Felix 2020 “ ‘Time Is Money’ and the Value of Translation.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 35–57. Do Carmo, Felix 2020 “ ‘Time Is Money’ and the Value of Translation.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 35–57. , 51)

This begs the question of the extent to which translators at both agencies are indeed selected for their subject-matter expertise, or whether, as in Moorkens (2020Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. , 13), they are “a small and interchangeable part within a system of DT [i.e., digital Taylorism] [that] can be swapped out without any detrimental effect to the system as a whole.” More research is needed to determine how working conditions for externalised translators working for boutique agencies targeting the premium market match those practised in the largest LSP labour platforms, as outlined in Moorkens (2020Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. Moorkens, Joss 2020 “A Tiny Cog in a Large Machine: Digital Taylorism in the Translation Industry.” Translation Spaces 9 (1): 12–34. , 17) and Fırat (2024)Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.Fırat, Gökhan 2024 Translation Work in the Digital Economy: Working Conditions of Translators on Platforms and in Cooperatives. PhD diss. University of Surrey.. There are some indications that experienced academic translators are subject to adverse selection by specialist academic translation agencies (Chan 2005Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2005 “Why Are Most Translators Underpaid? A Descriptive Explanation Using Asymmetric Information and a Suggested Solution from Signaling Theory.” Translation Journal 9 (2). https://​translationjournal​.net​/journal​/32asymmetric​.htmChan, Andy Lung Jan 2005 “Why Are Most Translators Underpaid? A Descriptive Explanation Using Asymmetric Information and a Suggested Solution from Signaling Theory.” Translation Journal 9 (2). https://​translationjournal​.net​/journal​/32asymmetric​.htm). Burlat (2022Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales., 33) states that Cadenza pays its translators seven pence per word (she does not state if this is per source or target word). The one translation project offer I have seen from Lex Academic offered a rate of around two and a half pence per English word in 2022.1111.These rates are commensurate with the rates paid for non-specialist translation for agencies identified by the 2023 Inbox Translation industry survey; see Penet (2025Penet, J. C. 2025 “Freelance Translation.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 43–58). Penet, J. C. 2025 “Freelance Translation.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 43–58). , 46). Burlat (2022Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales., 68) further quotes an experienced full-time academic translator anonymised as “Léa,” who priced herself out of the agency market at eleven euro cents (i.e., around nine pence) per word the same year. Agency work therefore represents an earnings penalty for professional academic translators with a sole trader profile, who earn more through work with direct clients. This suggests that the “premium market” pricing effect for “skilled human translators” touted by specialist agencies, and discussed by Lambert and Walker (2022Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2022 “Because We’re Worth It: Disentangling Freelance Translation, Status, and Rate-Setting in the United Kingdom.” Translation Spaces 11 (2): 277–302. , 284), does not, in fact, always look very different to standard agencies from the point of view of the externalised gig translators working for them. Full-time academic translator Katharine Throssell has stated that:

à mon sens la traduction des publications de recherche par des agences, qui doivent minimiser des coûts, ne permet pas toujours d’effectuer ce travail et cette mise en confiance dans de bonnes conditions. (Throssell et al. 2020Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54.Throssell, Katharine, Lucy Garnier, Annabelle Allouch, and Camille Noûs 2020 “La traduction en sciences sociales, miroir des réformes de la recherche universitaire [Translating the social sciences, a mirror for the reforms in university research].” Savoir/Agir 53: 40–54., 46)1212.Burlat (2022Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales.Burlat, Lison 2022 Devenir traductrice spécialisée dans les sciences humaines et sociales. L’analyse d’une profession féminisée en quête de légitimation [Women becoming translators specialising in the social and human sciences: Analysis of a feminized profession seeking legitimation]. MA diss. École des hautes études en sciences sociales., 10) likewise identifies two contradictory trends for independent academic translators, with increasing professionalisation on the one hand as the market expands, and casualisation on the other as agencies encroach on the labour market for academic translation.

‘for me, translating research publications via agencies, which have to keep costs down, means the work cannot always be done and trust built in the best conditions.’

In terms of Porter’s value chain, the language transfer competence core to the translation process is therefore not a strategically relevant activity per se for the new generation of academic translation agencies. It is worth pointing out here that this model differs from that of Samuelsson-Brown (2006)Samuelsson-Brown, Geoffrey 2006 Managing Translation Services. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Samuelsson-Brown, Geoffrey 2006 Managing Translation Services. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. , outlined above, which counts (in-house) translation as a (if not the) key step in the value chain. Rather, the individual, casualised translators are suppliers who generate upstream value for themselves, that value then entering the agency value chain in turn as a purchased input — the raw material subject to inbound logistics that it would be uneconomic to integrate in terms of vertical scope.1313.An alternative reading based in Service-Dominant Logic (SD Logic), explored in Kujamäki (2020)Kujamäki, Minna 2020 “Applying Service-Dominant Logic to Translation Service Provision.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 60: 191–207.Kujamäki, Minna 2020 “Applying Service-Dominant Logic to Translation Service Provision.” HERMES: Journal of Language and Communication in Business 60: 191–207., posits that the key facility for translation service provision is knowledge. This is broken down into human capital (the knowledge supplied by individuals involved in the production process), structural capital (e.g., in-house information systems), and relational capital (relationships with clients and other stakeholders). In this reading, the human capital embodied in in-house editors can be hypothesised to generate more value for the agency than the human capital of subcontracted translators.

In a value chain reading, the in-house employees all then add value to the raw translation in various ways. At Cadenza, the presence of in-house editing suggests that this process is a value generator at the operations stage. Editorial improvements to raw translation account for the bulk of the work carried out in-house, accounting for five out of seven employees in 2022 (one of whom combined editing with project management for the Spanish-language market) (Cadenza Academic 2022Cadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAkCadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAk). For this stage to be conducted in-house, it can be presumed that its contribution to the value chain outweighs the associated wage costs; otherwise, it would presumably make sense for this step to be subcontracted, like translation.

Procurement of outsourced translatorial and/or editorial talent is another key activity, carried out by project managers. Arabella Bond, project manager at Cadenza, described her duties in 2022 as “everything from corresponding with clients, workflow, team building, accounts, payroll, and troubleshooting” (Cadenza Academic 2022Cadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAkCadenza Academic 2022 “Journey of an Academic Translation.” Cadenza Academic Translations Team Talk at Exeter Translation Festival 2022, YouTube. https://​www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=qTWviU2ALAk, 00:02:29–00:02:35). As Porter (1985Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press.Porter, Michael 1985 Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. New York: Free Press., 43) points out, such human resource management is crucial to value generation “through its role in determining the skills and motivation of employees and the cost of hiring and training.”

As a larger business, Lex Academic’s operation calls for more support activity and is therefore more management-heavy, with a CEO, COO, and chairperson in addition to a quality controller who oversees the production process and a part-time project manager spearheading the firm’s expansion into East Asia. The firm also employs one editorial project manager and translator, alongside two other roles in support of non-translatorial author services (STEM and copywriting). Interestingly, the majority of in-house staff do have doctorates, suggesting that, in their case more than for the externalised and invisibilised translators, academic credentials have a strong role as value-creating signalling mechanisms for clients (Chan 2011Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2011 Information Economics and the Translation Profession. London: Lambert Academic.Chan, Andy Lung Jan 2011 Information Economics and the Translation Profession. London: Lambert Academic.; Hanson, Mellinger, and Walker 2025Hanson, Thomas, Christopher Mellinger, and Callum Walker 2025 “Economic Perspectives on the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 267–290). Hanson, Thomas, Christopher Mellinger, and Callum Walker 2025 “Economic Perspectives on the Translation Industry.” In Walker and Lambert (2025, 267–290). , 281). The editing process, too, is heavily externalised to a pool of some two hundred freelance editors (Chapman 2022Chapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-eliteChapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-elite), suggesting its principal value-generating activity is its role as a labour hub.

One further indication of the importance of in-house roles in generating value are salaries on offer to in-house staff. Job advertisements for in-house positions at Lex Academic offer salaries and conditions commensurate with comparable alternative careers such as publishing and academia, suggesting that professional experience is held at a premium since adverse selection on wages would be detrimental to the value generation process.1414.The “Vacancies” section of Lex Academic’s website currently offers a remote position at £25 000–£30 000 per annum subject to experience and pension for an editorial project manager with five years’ experience. This is commensurate with early-career salaries in UK publishing for 2025 (Bright Network 2025Bright Network 2025 “A Guide to Average Publishing Salaries in the UK.” Accessed February 27, 2026. https://​www​.brightnetwork​.co​.uk​/career​-path​-guides​/journalism​-publishing​/guide​-publishing​-salaries/Bright Network 2025 “A Guide to Average Publishing Salaries in the UK.” Accessed February 27, 2026. https://​www​.brightnetwork​.co​.uk​/career​-path​-guides​/journalism​-publishing​/guide​-publishing​-salaries/). It is also commensurate with early-career stipendiary lectureships. Post-doc salaries tend to be somewhat higher, but the market is extremely competitive (Society for the Study of French History 2025Society for the Study of French History 2025 “ECR in 2025: What Is it Like?” Accessed October 30, 2025. https://​frenchhistorysociety​.co​.uk​/6691/Society for the Study of French History 2025 “ECR in 2025: What Is it Like?” Accessed October 30, 2025. https://​frenchhistorysociety​.co​.uk​/6691/). This chimes with Chapman’s client-facing differentiation strategy, explored earlier in this article, as she states:

when everybody is paid better, everyone does a better job, and the clients get better value for money than if they’d paid a little bit less. [...] It is in our contracts that our staff get an automatic inflation-tied salary increase, in addition to any possible promotion. This is really important to us, first and foremost because it’s the [sic] obviously the right thing to do. Why would you want the people you most rely on to suddenly be earning less against the cost of living than they were the year before when the company was smaller?(Chapman 2022Chapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-eliteChapman, Louise 2022 “Nothing Lax about Lex as It Thrives Among Academic Elite.” BusinessWeekly, October 24, 2022. https://​www​.businessweekly​.co​.uk​/posts​/nothing​-lax​-about​-lex​-as​-it​-thrives​-among​-academic​-elite)

Based on the relative rates of growth of the two businesses examined in this paper, it can be hypothesised that the step generating the greatest value in the translation production process is, in fact, the operations stage of running a labour platform, levering its organisational capacities to act as intermediary between translator and end client.

7.Conclusion

Obrecht’s (1959)Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. Obrecht, Dean H. 1959 “On the Professional Status of Academic Translators.” Modern Language Journal 43 (2): 83–84. opinion piece pointed to how translation can generate value as an upstream supplier for other businesses that buy in translation services as part of their procurement process. Homing in on today’s business of translation agencies demonstrates that translation generates the most value for agencies when kept as a flexible, outsourced, bought-in service. Raw translation editing is, for Cadenza, a key value-generating operation, maintained in-house; for Lex, both translation and translation editing are mainly subject to procurement, its main operation being the monetisation not so much of translatorial labour per se but of the organisational capacities of the platform model and its ability to scale up the effective, flexible provision of translatorial labour, thereby bridging the “structural hole” between translator-vendors and academics-clients (Burt 2004Burt, Ronald S. 2004 “Structural Holes and Good Ideas.” American Journal of Sociology 110 (2): 349–399. Burt, Ronald S. 2004 “Structural Holes and Good Ideas.” American Journal of Sociology 110 (2): 349–399. ). In this sense, the term ‘academic translation agencies’ is perhaps something of a misnomer, as neither of the two agencies carries out translation as a core part of its operations.

In fact, since the first draft of this article was written in late 2024, the agencies have pursued increasingly divergent strategies. Cadenza has maintained its original narrow segment and industry scope, signalling highly skilled specialist human translation and editing in the humanities as its unique selling point. Lex Academic has, however, broadened its scope to incorporate a wide range of author services, including AI translation for academic content. It does so, tellingly and as detailed in a sub-page on “Post-AI Translation Editing” on its website (Lex Academic n.d.Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/Lex Academic n.d. “Academic Translation Services.” Accessed January 24, 2025. https://​www​.lexacademic​.com​/academic​-translation/), on the grounds not only of cost, but because “securing the services of experienced translators with subject-matter expertise is challenging and expensive” — a statement that would seem to call into question its own quality signalling mechanisms elsewhere on the same website.

In terms of Gouadec’s (2005)Gouadec, Daniel 2005 “Modélisation du Processus d’Exécution des Traductions [Modelising the translation workflow].” Meta 50 (2): 643–655. Gouadec, Daniel 2005 “Modélisation du Processus d’Exécution des Traductions [Modelising the translation workflow].” Meta 50 (2): 643–655. model of the translation process, value is generated first and foremost for agencies by the pre- and post-transfer stages. If, then, the language transfer process itself is secondary to editing in generating value for translatorial labour hubs, this raises interesting questions for translator training and the relative emphasis that should be placed on each aspect of the overall competence set depending on the characteristics of the marketplace the student intends to work in. As entrepreneurship education becomes an increasing presence in the translation classroom (Galán-Mañas and Olalla-Soler 2021Galán-Mañas, Anabel, and Christian Olalla-Soler 2021 “Perceptions of Entrepreneurship in Translator Training.” The Interpreter and Translator Trainer 15 (4): 395–410. Galán-Mañas, Anabel, and Christian Olalla-Soler 2021 “Perceptions of Entrepreneurship in Translator Training.” The Interpreter and Translator Trainer 15 (4): 395–410. ), better equipping students to enter a rapidly changing professional landscape, value chain analyses of various translatorial labour models, from gig work and freelancing as a sole trader to in-house salaried positions, could become a useful tool for prospective translators seeking to maximise their own long-term financial stability.