Find What’s Been Lost in Translation

Traveling abroad without knowing the local language is a sure way to gain a new appreciation for the importance of communication. But while finding your way around on vacation can be a pain, it pales in comparison to the difficulties experienced by those that move to a new country without having yet learned the language. In these cases, people have to navigate visits to the doctor, meetings with lawyers, business transactions, and every other daily interaction in the face of a language barrier.

Technology is certainly helping to alleviate these issues. Smartphone apps, for example, can translate between languages to ease communication problems. However, these tools are still a bit clunky and make it very slow to convey one’s thoughts. They also frequently rely on cloud-based computing resources, which means you must trust the service providers (and the networks between you and them) with some very private information at times. What is really needed is a more natural solution that closely mimics a face-to-face conversation.

The crew over at Useful Sensors, which is making a name for itself by building simple and secure devices that enhance human connection, has just thrown their hat in the ring with an interesting tool called Torre. It looks like a dual-screen tablet that folds such that people can sit across from one another, with each seeing one of the screens. As each person talks, Torre translates their speech into the other individual’s native language and displays it on their screen in real-time.

This unique design enables people to sit across from one another and speak in a natural way, without awkward pauses or passing a device back and forth. And since the device can translate between over 200 languages, it can help in just about every situation.

In order to maintain privacy during sensitive conversations, the translation happens entirely on-device. No internet connection is required for operation. Instead, a custom large language model, named Moonshine, was developed by the team. The model was purpose-built for speech-to-text translation tasks, and it was optimized for execution on resource-constrained devices, so no cloud-based computing systems need to be involved.

At present, the device is primarily being targeted at applications in healthcare, the legal professions, and business. But the seamless and secure way that the system works would be just as valuable for a chat between friends. Those interested can lease Torre directly from Useful Sensors for $100 per month.