Localisation is an industrial process which takes digital content, which could be web content, technical manuals, software or any publications and translate that content into a number of target languages. This process can also involve the cultural adaptation of the content and the transformation of character formats. As an industrial process this needs to be accomplished with high throughput, consistent quality and low cost.

The localisation industry is facing numerous challenges. Firstly, there has been a change in the balance of product and service flows as a result of globalisation. There has also been a major change in the way software is developed with new web-based business models which can result in the perpetual beta view of software products. This results in a constant stream of content and products that need to be localised rather than the periodical releases which were part of the traditional product delivery cycle. Finally, user-generated content has become increasingly important in supplementing the professionally authored content related to a product. Localising this content provides its own set of challenges.