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Engineers at ETREMA Products, Inc. face the challenge of designing devices using magnetostrictive materials, which change shape when exposed to a magnetic field. These materials are crucial for the production of transducers, sensors, and other high-powered electrical devices. The unique properties of magnetostrictive materials, such as their ability to mechanically respond to magnetic fields and their characteristic nonlinearity, make designing these devices complex. The challenge is to accurately represent the material properties and complex physics interactions within such devices to facilitate the production of the next generation of smart products.

Observing and analyzing regions in outer space where new stars and planets are born requires extremely sensitive detectors. Radiation and overheating can cause these detectors to fail. Using multiphysics simulation, a team at SRON is developing a calibration source for an imaging spectrometer that can operate with such vulnerable equipment. Heat management takes on a unique role in outer space, especially for cryogenic systems that demand extremely low temperatures in order to detect thermal radiation. This was a challenge faced by the engineering team at SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research when designing the SpicA Far-InfraRed Instrument (SAFARI), an infrared camera that measures the complete far-infrared spectrum for each image pixel. SAFARI will fly aboard the Japanese Space Infrared Telescope for Cosmology and Astrophysics (SPICA). SPICA will look deeper into space than any space telescope has before. Because SAFARI has ultrasensitive detectors, cooled to slightly above absolute zero, it can pick up weaker far-infrared radiation than previous space cameras. Precise on-ground and in-space calibration is crucial to the accuracy of the sensors and the success of the mission. To design and optimize these calibration systems, the team at SRON turned to a COMSOL Multiphysics® simulation as their guide.

The desire to eliminate batteries and power lines is motivating a wide range of research. In the quest for systems that are energy autonomous, the concept of energy harvesting is attracting a great deal of attention. For researchers at Siemens Corporate Technology in Munich, exploring the potential of an energy-harvesting microelectromechanical system (MEMS) generator holds strong appeal. The researchers chose to design a microgenerator for an innovative tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) driven by motion. Yet locating the device within the tire requires that the assembly be extremely robust and able to withstand gravitational accelerations up to 2500 g. Moreover, to avoid tire imbalance it would have to be very light, and in terms of operational life it would need to match that of a tire—a minimum of eight years.

Treating arteries in the heart that have been blocked by plaque is a common challenge for medical professionals. Known as stenosis, this condition restricts blood flow to the heart, resulting in symptoms such as shortness of breath and chest pain. It is sometimes resolved using stents, which are small, mesh-like tubular structures designed to treat blocked arteries. They are usually placed in the coronary artery and expanded with a balloon catheter to keep the artery open. While stents are successful at holding arteries open, an artery can re-narrow because of excessive tissue growth over the stent. This is called restenosis and is the body’s natural healing response, but it can actually impede recovery. Thus, drug-eluting stents were developed to deliver medicine — which acts to reduce cell proliferation and prevent the unwanted growth — into the artery tissue. These contain a coating composed of medicine and a polymer matrix designed to provide a controlled delivery; each strand of the stent mesh is surrounded by this coating. Stent designs have improved dramatically in recent years in an effort to reduce restenosis rates, but much remains unknown regarding the release process.

Laboratory tests, such as hematology analysis, influence up to 70 percent of critical decisions including hospital admittance, discharge, and treatment. The accuracy of these tests is crucial for patient outcomes. HORIBA Medical, a global supplier of medical diagnostic equipment, faced challenges in optimizing their hematology analysis equipment using physical prototypes alone. The complexity of the physical processes involved, such as high fluid velocity, pressure drop, heat transfer, and intense electric fields, made it difficult to achieve accurate measurements. Additionally, factors like particle trajectory and orientation through the micro-aperture system further complicated the accuracy of the impedance measurement system.

Nordson had successfully established a global market presence—but lacked the structure and tools to ensure brand cohesion. Given the decentralized nature of their organization, each division had their own approach to translating and localizing content for their market. As a result, the content intended to represent their brand with a singular voice and style was being interpreted by several different vendors. Not surprisingly, Nordson noticed inconsistencies with how their company’s message was being communicated and with the quality of the translations. Nordson’s mission to provide reliable, top-tier services to their customers drove them to reevaluate this initial digital globalization strategy. They needed flexible, accurate website translation support that could be implemented quickly and at scale. Lionbridge had the tools and expertise to meet that need.

Philips Personal Health faced challenges with the creation, translation, and publication process of its Directions for Use (DFUs). The company struggled with variable quality, long turnaround times, and an inefficient review process. Philips aimed to make the DFU creation process 25% more efficient by reducing changes during the process, increasing standardization and reuse, reducing resources spent on reviews, gaining efficiency at publication, and improving the reliability and efficiency of the documentation system. Philips needed a language service provider (LSP) that could integrate seamlessly with Author-it to streamline the translation process and create efficiencies through increased automation and centralization. Their previous LSP could not integrate with Author-it, but Lionbridge could, making it an attractive option for Philips.

In 2013, Lionbridge was invited to review the company’s Manufacturing Engineering (ME) activities, which are supported by approximately 2000 Mechanical Engineers plus management resources. Post-review it became clear that approximately 15-20% of the designated engineering time was taken up by essential but non-engineering deliverables. This resulted in inflated costs, wasted high-skill, high-value engineering hours, and lost momentum on key programs.

Lionbridge faced the challenge of creating and managing technical publications and user support/product documentation across various media formats. The company needed to ensure compliance with industry standards, deploy content to global audiences, and leverage global locations for cost-effective production. Additionally, Lionbridge aimed to enhance content creation for ease of translation and effectively outsource entire projects or documentation requirements.

The increasing complexity, volume, and delivery expectations in translation and localization efforts can erode quality standards and safeguards, leading to costly inefficiencies and errors. Organizations face challenges in maintaining high-quality translations while managing costs and ensuring quick turnaround times. The need for a robust quality assurance system becomes critical to optimize global communication efforts for efficiency and quality.

Global medical device organizations face significant operational pressures that strain their content efficiencies. These pressures stem from the need to manage a wide array of content types, including product labeling, technical publications, regulatory documents, and marketing communications materials. The complexity is further compounded by the necessity to comply with stringent regulatory standards across multiple countries and languages. Additionally, the rapid pace of technological advancements and market demands require these organizations to continuously update and manage their content effectively. This situation creates a challenging environment where maintaining high-quality, accurate, and timely content is critical for success.

With an increasing number of international trials and an ever-changing global regulatory environment, the challenges associated with Investigational Medicinal Product (IMP) labeling grow every day. Lengthening production timelines, errors and inconsistencies, and a demanding process of managing different vendors across global trials are some of the key issues faced. These challenges can lead to delays of four, six, or even eight weeks for a single panel label. Additionally, multiple vendors across studies can result in outright translation and regulatory mistakes, making the process even more demanding for robust organizations.

A global aerospace and manufacturing leader sought to eliminate inefficiencies in its drafting change order process. Change orders processed through the existing model were time-consuming and irregular and required costly ad hoc efforts on the part of technical documentation professionals and engineers. With so much time spent administrating change orders, technical documentation professionals and engineers had little time to focus on their core responsibilities. With a clear picture of the problem, senior management set out to fix it. The decision was made to outsource the drafting change order process to a select group of 12 qualified vendors, and eventually narrow down to two. The expectation was that, through outsourcing, the company would reduce expenses by leveraging locally managed, globally operated labor resources, while freeing up domestic technical documentation professionals and engineers resources. To their surprise, many of the vendors were not able to deliver the promised cost and time savings, requiring endless training and extensive support. Of the 12, only Lionbridge remains, ranking highest in performance with impressive adaptability and earning an A+ through its unique RevSourceSM process.

There were several obstacles complicating the CRO’s path to optimized translation operations: A decentralized process, which had arisen from regional autonomy in both the initiation and management of translation projects. Multiple disparate systems housing the content and data required through the translation process. Varying methods of translation review being conducted in the regions. Translation hurdles that included inconsistencies, errors, slow turnaround times, capacity and language limits, along with highly inefficient communication. Hundreds of global team members across the Americas, Europe, and Asia with pressing translation project needs. The CRO needed a partner who tackle all its operational obstacles and help establish a model to prioritize its needs and enable a manageable scale-up and execution schedule.

Around the world, the popularity of voice search is only growing. As our client seeks to provide fast and accurate search and voice assistance services to users of every major language worldwide, it must understand a variety of voice-activated queries in multiple languages. Global speakers of major languages expect voice-activated apps and search engines to fully and correctly understand voice queries, regardless of the type of voice, regional accent, age, gender, device used, or surrounding environment. With billions of global users and the complexities of processing natural language, fully and correctly recognizing any user’s speech in any language is our client’s complex challenge.

As a decentralized organization, Dorel Juvenile previously relied on multiple, in-market translators to execute translations in its European markets. Efficiency and speed varied among the translators, making it difficult to deliver translations with uniformity. Dorel Juvenile sought the services of one Language Service Provider (LSP) for its European markets to achieve uniform processes and faster translation delivery times. Quality was another incentive. Since the company had no translation memories, glossaries or style guides to draw upon, individual translators provided their own spin during the translation process, making brand voice inconsistent. Dorel Juvenile set out to: Achieve brand consistency throughout its markets, Reduce the amount of time it would take to complete translations, Reach its customers across multiple platforms.

Epson Europe required 147 InDesign files to be translated into 25+ languages for product packaging, marketing materials, and banner ads. These assets needed to be ready before the launch of their largest and highest-visibility marketing campaign of the year. Typically, a Language Service Provider (LSP) would take six to eight weeks to complete this type of job, but Epson Europe needed it done in just two weeks. With a drop-dead deadline and no option for failure, the brand asked Lionbridge to figure out how to significantly shave off production time to meet the aggressive time frame without sacrificing quality.

The customer required a global partner to manage their publishing on their homepage and internal channels, staying in line with local market requirements and delivering quick turnaround times. The customer needed content publishing services for its United States, Canada, Hong Kong, Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, and United Kingdom markets.

In-house terminology can be incredibly niche and specialized. This terminology must be managed in a way that all employees can understand it and use it in a consistent way – via a knowledge database. Swisscom Rollout & Access did not have a database of this kind, and consequently editors were inconsistent in their use of specialist terminology and abbreviations. This generated uncertainty among document users such as planners, site managers, installers, and training course participants. Swisscom Rollout & Access was looking for a terminology solution that would achieve: Consistent use of specialist terminology and abbreviations, a central glossary, available online and offline, rapid terminology and definition searching, and effortless integration of new specialist terminology.

For many European citizens, the arrival of summer means one thing: tourism. But in a world coping with COVID-19, it was also sure to bring new challenges. Those in the tourism industry would be met with unprecedented uncertainties: How many people will be traveling? Where will they be coming from? Where will they be traveling to? What are their safety expectations? How will travel sentiments and expectations vary country-to-country? And most importantly: What are travelers’ main safety concerns? Our client needed a way to assess traveler intentions and expectations in order to communicate safety measures for a multi-need, multilingual audience.

Kiwibank needed a solution to monitor and reduce computer energy consumption without disrupting users. It also needed to wake computers up out of business hours to patch them. A key requirement was to find a solution that integrated with Kiwibank’s existing Microsoft Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr) platform.

Syngenta faced a significant challenge in managing over 250 applications across its business, both licensed and in-house developed. The company needed an automated process that would allow desk-based and mobile workers to select and download the applications they needed without involving highly experienced technical administrators. The manual process of handling software requests through the IT helpdesk was time-consuming and inefficient, leading to delays and frustration among users. The central administration team was overwhelmed with an average of 3,700 requests per month, each costing approximately $40, resulting in substantial operational costs.

Park Hill School District faced a challenge in managing user requests for new software. The existing process was slow, manual, and resource-intensive, requiring users to raise help desk tickets and wait several days for software installation. This inefficiency led to IT being perceived as inflexible, as it couldn't offer users the choice and flexibility they desired. The district needed a solution that integrated with their existing Systems Center Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr) and Active Directory, providing a user-friendly interface for on-demand self-service software installation.

Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority needed to reduce the energy costs associated with powering end user equipment. It also needed to deploy software patches and upgrades to those machines in a more effective and efficient manner.

Like most public sector organizations, the Council was under great pressure to deliver a diverse range of services on an increasingly constrained budget. Having identified energy consumption as an area where it could make savings, the council needed a solution that would allow it to monitor and reduce computer energy consumption without disrupting users.

Having already manually completed a Windows 7 upgrade a couple of years previously, the company was keen to take a different approach as it upgraded to Windows 8. It also wanted to find a systems management tool that would support automation – with a view to significantly improving migration speed, efficiency, and user experience. The company was also keen to create a leaner system by reducing the need for investment in new servers and reducing the time and effort spent on maintaining the operating system.

The company faced severe challenges in managing content distributions, given its highly distributed environment and large number of remote PCs. It was facing massive management burdens of a large distribution point array and thousands of individual remote network links, and had been relying on express shipping images on CDs throughout the world in order to keep endpoint machines properly imaged and up to date – an expensive and time-consuming manual process.

Norfolk and Waveney MHFT were looking for a solution that would consolidate its overall desktop management and include the following requirements: single desktop maintenance system, consolidation of existing toolsets, less intrusive patch management, and lower energy consumption. The Trust's ICT department, responsible for all core IT infrastructure and services, faced challenges with high energy consumption due to overnight upgrades and the practice of leaving computers on all night. This was in direct conflict with the Trust’s wish to become ‘greener’ and save money.

Verizon Wireless made a commitment to deploy a range of technologies specifically designed to provide a “greener”, lower energy solution, without compromising on performance or reliability. The company operates several call centers across the country, providing service and support for its customers. These centers run advanced communications software and systems which are constantly monitored to ensure they offer the best solution for the company and its customers. As part of a growing awareness of the benefits of reducing energy consumption, Verizon Wireless sought to implement technologies that would reduce energy usage and CO2 emissions while maintaining high performance and reliability.

Software was a challenging topic for this bank: it was plagued by software license sprawl, software audits, enterprise agreement renegotiations and manual processes. It wanted to address software compliance and usage for its top vendors as a matter of urgency to halt spiraling costs. The bank’s software asset inventory featured some major gaps – resulting in a need for many hours of costly consultant hours. The data harvesting procedure was labor intensive, unsustainable and inefficient. What the bank needed was a single, centralized portal featuring an automated approval process that would empower end users and integrate seamlessly with third party ticketing systems.