Everyone who has tried knows how difficult it can be to express oneself in an accurate way and to find the right words.
- It all started out when I wrote a lot in English at my former job, says Ola Persson, CEO of WordFinder. In my opinion, it was a hassle to constantly find the right information in a dictionary, and I thought that there should be a product that is more accessible while typing on the computer. I developed a prototype and contacted a publishing house.
After that it all began. First of all with Prisma's Swedish-English dictionary on the computer, then the English-Swedish version as well.
Now, 20 years later, there are 120 titles and 15 languages available. These titles are licensed from approximately 30 leading publishers around the world.
The product is addressed to anyone who writes in foreign languages, including large multinational companies such as Volvo, Ericsson and Astra Zeneca. All of these are examples of Swedish companies that use English as their corporate language and are customers of WordFinder. Furthermore, among the customers there are also banks and insurance companies, and - perhaps more surprisingly - schools and doctors.
- Then we have our "super-users", says Ola Persson. The super-users are the translators who have, as opposed to big companies, maybe just one license but many dictionaries. They help us to develop new features continually.
WordFinder's mission is to create better understanding between people in global businesses, but the vision states – Reach out to the world!
There is no real competitor in Sweden. There are a few free sites on the web which do not hold the same standards as real dictionaries. Ola Persson says that although there may be 1-2 players per country abroad with their own solutions, no solution has so far reached the quality of WordFinder.
Furthermore, it is both easier and cheaper for publishers to sell their dictionaries to WordFinder than creating their own similar products. In Sweden, for example, Norstedts used to have a similar product, but now they cooperate with Ola Person and his company instead.
The technical progress is made in collaboration with outside companies who work under the contract specifications that WordFinder sets. They get royalties for sold products, a solution Ola Persson is very pleased with. From the point of view of content, he works in a similar manner with licensed publishers.
WordFinder offers dictionaries in English, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Russian, Polish, German, Dutch, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese and Japanese, but according to Ola, there will be opportunities for more languages in the future.
He says that the U.S. military has put up a request to also have the languages of Arabic, Farsi and Pashto, which is not impossible. Also, Korean may be added to the system in the future.
In addition to Sweden, WordFinder has customers in Scandinavia, Europe and the rest of the world. Therefore, the company has subsidiaries in Denmark as well as in Norway and there is also an office in Washington, which process the U.S. market. Obviously, WordFinder also sells their products on the Web.
WordFinder – a Swedish company that is on track to achieve its vision – Reach out to the world!