Tarjimly: Translating for Humanity

Solution Pitch

The Problem

Globally, 44% of 30 million refugees can't understand the information they're given or communicate with people trying to help them. In the US, 76% of medical providers report poor access to interpretation services, needed by 60 million people. This leads to denial of service, errors, and ultimately adverse health outcomes.

The Solution

Tarjimly is the world’s most accessible translation service and is doubling the speed of humanitarian support. A massive human-powered community is combined with scalable technology to remove language barriers. When beneficiaries such as refugees, immigrants, and humanitarians create a request on the mobile app, a machine learning matching algorithm instantly connects them with the best available trained translator from a community of 44,000 volunteers, speaking 120 different languages, with whom they communicate, translate, and interpret over text and voice. Users can submit document translations, filter by gender, dialect, and unique expertise, and use our innovative multi-party calling feature by Twilio to allow access to nearly anywhere in the world.

Stats

• 21,872 humanitarians and refugees are currently signed up on the app and looking for help.

• Users of the app can be found in the US, Iraq, Greece, UK, and India

• Tarjimly has been used 7688 times for medical purposes since 2018. 

• 4262 translators have medical translation experience and have been trained, retained, and are available for the under-resourced communities.

Market Opportunity

There is a huge need within the humanitarian sector and government agencies resettling refugees worldwide. UNHCR calculated this year that catering to the needs of all refugees globally would require $8.9 billion in funding.

Organization Highlights

• Tarjimly partners with humanitarian organizations to increase access to refugees worldwide, with language communities to grow the translator community, and with tech companies to build a reliable product.

• Partnered with Welcome.US to share services with more than 40 organizations who are working to resettle Afghan refugees in the US and expect a similar partnership for Ukrainian refugees this year. 

• Successfully piloted with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) for the resettlement of Afghan refugees in Qatar. 

• Close to long-term contracts with several IRC, Red Cross, UNICEF, and IOM Middle East country offices.

• Partnerships with the UNHCR Panama, MSF in NY, World Relief Seattle and Memphis, SF Department of Public Health, VECINA, Hearts & Homes for Refugees, Iskashitaa, AJAPO, and Displaced Collective.

• Partners with universities, language schools, and diaspora communities with volunteer opportunities and marketing to increase language coverage and build an army of volunteers for each language. Current translation partners include Propio, Tandem, Afghan American Community Organization, BMC software and Amava.

• Partnering with tech companies such as Amazon, Twilio, and Atlassian on volunteer engagements to help build features such as global multi-party calling.

• Partners with philanthropic entities like Fast Forward, Full Circle Fund, Echoing Green, DRK, Highland, and Silicon Valley Community Foundation to fund operations and build organizational capacity.

Partnership Goals

Tarjimly seeks:

• Expertise on business development and sales

• Expertise on mobile and web app development