LT-Innovate welcomes the Connecting Europe Facility and calls for the inclusion of a Multilingual Digital Service Infrastructure as a matter of priority.

In an Open Letter to Neelie Kroes, Jochen Hummel, Chaiman of LT-Innovate and CEO of ESTeam offers to the Commissioner the encouragement and full collaboration of LT-Innovate in making the European Language Cloud available to European institutions, businesses and citizens as soon as possible. Why? 

"In our view, a major public investment in ICT networks is only justified if it goes hand in hand with a substantial effort to create and/or strengthen European platforms, in particular a language platform." To make business on a multilingual continent, we need to overcome "the language barriers that are still one of the main factors accounting for the fragmentation of the Single Market."

In addition, "the European Language Cloud would considerably bring down the costs of cross-border products and services and allow all Europeans to seamlessly interact with the 1 billion+ market of speakers of European languages. This would constitute a major opportunity and boost for the European economy and society, creating many new jobs. In a second step, such a platform should also support the languages of our major trading partners, thus making European companies fittest for the global markets."

To read the full open letter, click here.