PLG Latest Customer Feedback

We love when our clients fill out our survey. This year, we have begun to ask our clients what they think about our services after we have delivered their projects. Below are a few recent comments that we have received:

“The service was quick and the employees were pleasant and helpful.”

“Very fast service. Very easy to use. Very helpful people.”

“Very quick and polite service.

“Attention to detail was superb. Fast, accurate and very responsive to changes. Our Project Manager, Crista, was excellent to work with. She made this project work so smoothly for us.”

“Responsive, prompt. Follows through on promises.”

“Excellent service and turnaround time.”

Thank you for all of your feedback! Take the survey here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=en_US&pli=1&formkey=dHZtVXdLWTlfYjdVZUtKejl2ZGFlaWc6MQ

PLG Will Attend IMTS 2012

In a few weeks, Chicago will hold the largest manufacturing trade show in North America, and representatives from Precision Language and Graphics will surely be there. In 2010 when we were there, we formed many relationships with both small and large U.S. manufacturers who were interested in translating their material to sell their products overseas. To our readers who do not know about the show, the IMTS is a six-day trade show held every other year at Chicago's McCormick Place, the largest convention center in North America. In 2010, the show had 82,411 attendees, exceeding people’s expectations. The increased interest that the IMTS received may be a sign that manufacturing may be making a comeback in the United States. The show receives a lot of interest from individuals and companies from other leading and emerging manufacturing countries such as China, Brazil, Japan, Germany, the UK and France.

For more information about the IMTS, please visit http://www.imts.com/

Do please let us know if you will be attending the show!

How PLG serves the Manufacturing Community

Precision Language and Graphics continues to strive to be a leader in language services for the manufacturing and industrial sector. PLG has the capability to translate into more than 60 languages, many of which are important to the industry, including Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Chinese and Portuguese. Our Managing Director, Eric Zhang, has played a major role in expanding our translation services for the manufacturing, engineering and industrial sectors. Before joining us at PLG in 2001, Eric worked for Motorola, CTS and Foxconn as an engineer and later in various manufacturing related positions. Eric is currently a translator and interpreter for the Chinese language and offers China-U.S. business consulting services. To find out more about Eric Zhang, please visit Eric's company profile here.

For more information about our manufacturing services, please visit our technical translation services pages.

Which U.S. President Spoke The Most Languages?

It seems that a higher percentage of American Presidents speak another language than the general American population. At least 50% of American Presidents speak or spoke a second language other than English, compared to only 25% of current Americans (whether conversationally or fluent). Some of our greatest presidents and founding fathers were even multilingual, speaking more than two languages, including John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, John Quincy Adams and James Madison. Thomas Jefferson claimed to be able to read and write six different languages, but some historians suggest that it could have been more. There has only been one American president whose first language was not English, and that is Martin Van Buren, who was born in Dutch-speaking New York. James Madison was an avid translator, producing many translations of Latin works into English. Below is a more thorough list by language:

Dutch: John Quincy Adams, Martin Van Buren

French: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, William Henry Harrison, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt

German: John Quincy Adams, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Bill Clinton

Greek/Classical Greek: Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Quincy Adams, John Tyler, James K. Polk, James Buchanan, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Chester A. Arthur

Hebrew: James Madison

Indonesian: Barrack Obama

Italian: Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt

Latin: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Quincy Adams, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James K. Polk, James Buchanan, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Chester A. Arthur, Herbert Hoover

Mandarin Chinese: Herbert Hoover

Spanish: Thomas Jefferson, Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush

Modern Presidents are less likely than older presidents to speak another language. President Clinton can hold a casual conversation in German. President Bush speaks limited Spanish, having delivered the First Weekly Address in both English and Spanish. President Obama has repeatedly said that he is “embarrassed” that he does not speak a second language, but he has been heard to speak some Spanish and Indonesian. Republican nominee Mitt Romney learned how to speak fluent French after spending 2 years in Bordeaux, France as a Mormon missionary.