[show-current-language-name]
Well, it’s hard to believe that we’re into the final days of what has at times felt like the shortest year in decades. So much has happened across both the language interpretation and pure AI worlds in twelve months that we will reserve our wider observations for the industry for an in-depth ‘year in review’ blog post in January.
For now, in the spirit of reflecting on 2025, we’re taking a moment to look back on what has been one of the most impactful years in KUDO’s journey. Together with our clients, partners, and interpreter community, we’ve continued to push the boundaries of what’s possible in multilingual communication, at scale, in real time, and with precision. Where it matters most.
From global events to major advances in AI, this year marked a turning point in how organizations around the world connect across languages. Keep reading to find out how.
1. Powering Global Events at Unprecedented Scale
This year, KUDO supported multilingual communication for global events, conferences at a scale we’ve never seen before—spanning live, hybrid, and virtual formats across continents.
Beyond client events like executive town halls and large-scale public sector sessions, KUDO was the technology (live speech translation and captions) sponsor for a whopping 15 global events and tradeshows. These included Saudi Event Show, Integrated Systems Europe, The AI Summit New York, InfoComm, Tech for Retail, and AI for Africa. In total, over 100,000 attendees from around the world were able to follow the conference program in the language of their choice.
And as events grew larger and more complex, reliability, performance, and user experience remained at the core of everything we delivered.
2. Expanded Languages and Dialects with KUDO AI
Language access is only meaningful when it reflects how people actually speak.
This year, KUDO AI expanded its coverage with additional languages and niche dialects, helping organizations reach more audiences with greater cultural and linguistic accuracy. New languages include Amharic, Basque, Galician, Irish, Maltese, Marathi, Mongolian, Tamil, Zulu, and Welsh. These enhancements ensure that regional teams, local stakeholders, and global audiences can all participate with confidence and clarity.
3. Major Advances in AI Customization
We made significant progress in AI customization, giving enterprises greater control over how language is translated, spoken, and presented.
From custom glossaries and terminology handling to improved speech output and domain-specific tuning, KUDO AI is now more adaptable than ever. These advances are especially critical for organizations where accuracy, brand consistency, and regulatory language matter.
For KUDO’s human interpretation solution, the team released AI Assist. This feature represented a major leap in interpreter support technology, delivering live captions to help interpreters maintain precision, confidence, and cognitive endurance during even the most complex meetings.
4. Deeper Enterprise Adoption Across Regulated Industries
This year saw increased adoption of KUDO across highly regulated sectors, including healthcare, life sciences, finance, legal, and public institutions.
Organizations in these industries rely on KUDO for high-stakes communication where precision, accessibility, and trust are non-negotiable. Our growing footprint in regulated environments reflects the confidence enterprises place in KUDO’s technology, security, and delivery standards.
5. A Growing Global Partner Network
KUDO’s partner ecosystem continued to expand, reaching 32 global partners and resellers this year.
These partnerships play a critical role in extending KUDO’s reach, integrating language access into broader event, collaboration, and enterprise ecosystems, and delivering best-in-class multilingual experiences worldwide.
6. Growing Demand for APAC Languages on KUDO Marketplace
Across KUDO Marketplace, the world’s only marketplace for finding and booking professional language interpreters for any platform, we saw some interesting trends where demand for new languages was concerned.
Beyond the usual languages most requested for client meetings, we saw a 197% increase in meetings booked with Hindi interpreters. Our team also added professional interpreters that cover three Farsi-adjacent languages to the roster; Dari, Pashto, and Kurdish, as well as Urdu and Khmer. With APAC being the most linguistically diverse region in the world, we are expecting a further increase in demand for APAC language interpreters in 2026.
7. Expanding the KUDO Team
Behind every product milestone is a growing team.
This year, the KUDO Sales team expanded to support increased global demand, deeper enterprise engagements, and long-term customer success. Across the company, new talent joined with a shared mission: to make multilingual communication seamless, inclusive, and accessible for everyone.
8. Innovation Recognized: A 5th Patent Secured
As always, innovation for the purpose of accessibility remains at the heart of KUDO’s product development.
This year, we secured our fifth patent, reinforcing our commitment to building proprietary technology that advances real-time speech translation, interpretation workflows, and multilingual accessibility at scale.
9. Record Growth and Adoption of KUDO AI
KUDO AI achieved record growth this year with meetings using AI speech translation and captions increasing by 200% vs 2024. More and more organizations have now embraced AI-powered language access for events, meetings, training, and internal communications.
This growth underscores a broader shift: enterprises are no longer asking if multilingual access is necessary, but how to deliver it effectively, balancing automation with quality and user experience.
10. Introducing ‘Meet Now’: Instant Language Access In-Person
To close out the year, we launched ‘Meet Now’ on our mobile app; a new way to access instant language support for in-person meetings and live interactions.
Our Meet Now feature removes friction from multilingual communication, enabling users to activate language access immediately when the need arises, without advance scheduling or complex setup.
Looking Ahead to 2026
So, what’s on the cards for next year? Looking ahead, KUDO’s product roadmap is focused on making language accessibility even more seamless, customizable, and scalable.
By the end of Q4 2025, we’re completing two final product enhancements: the ability to schedule recurring meetings with KUDO, and a new “try it now” experience that lets anyone test KUDO AI directly on our website and instantly understand how real-time speech translation and captions work.
Building on that momentum, 2026 will be a year of major evolution. We’ll be expanding platform integrations with a native Zoom integration, introducing AI voice options by language and gender, and rolling out a fully redesigned KUDO interface to dramatically simplify meeting setup and reduce friction for organizers. We’ll also continue to broaden global access with dozens of new translation languages on KUDO AI.
Together, these innovations reflect our commitment to making multilingual communication effortless, precise, and truly global in 2026 and beyond.
Thank You to Our Community
Of course, none of the above would have been possible without the trust and continued collaboration of our global community.
We want to sincerely thank:
- Our clients, for choosing and trusting KUDO to support their most important conversations.
- Our partners, for helping extend multilingual access across platforms and regions.
- Our interpreter community, whose expertise, professionalism, and dedication continue to set the standard for high-quality communication.
Together, we are shaping a more inclusive, connected world, one conversation at a time. As we look ahead, we’re excited to continue innovating, scaling, and working alongside you to redefine what global communication can be.
Here’s to another year of breaking language barriers—together.