Microsoft, Oracle, and VMWare went to Argentina to tell some 170 delegates from ten countries which flavor of Spanish they prefer for their software in the first event organized by the Localization World producers south of the Equator. Although several badges were never picked up from the registration table by those participants forced to stay home by travel bans and spending freezes, the three tracks of the program provided for informative sessions and lively discussions. Some of our observations:

• Clusters of localization show up in Córdoba and Rosario (Argentina), and in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). While Buenos Aires and São Paulo are the biggest business centers in South America, very few companies from these cities play a role in the global language services market. This was reflected in the dismal attendance of companies from these cities.
• Spanish is one language. While there are a few terminology areas with words that vary a lot from country to country — like culinary and apparel terms — native speakers agree that by now everybody is used to the Microsoft Spanish standard for software user interfaces. In the vast majority of cases, two or more versions of Spanish are not required, except for marketing purposes.
• Portuguese is a language with two official spellings. The Orthographic Agreement that standardizes the spelling European and Brazilian Portuguese is in effect and will start to be taught in schools in 2009; it will be fully deployed by 2012. However, that does not change the facts that Portugal (10 million people; GDP of US$210 billion) and Brazil (190 million people; GDP of US$1.6 trillion) use different words for basic technology terms —  such as a computer mouse and screen — and that a Brazilian native has a very hard time understanding the speech of someone from Portugal.
• Latin America is a repository of talent. The combination of cheap people and above average skills seems to be the main attraction in Latin America for LSPs. We have yet to see any innovations in language technology or process coming from this region.

The Malbec wine and delicious asados in Puerto Madero served as the backdrop for three days of serious discussions about the future of translation and localization services in the region. The lingering question is: When will the first global LSP based in Latin America emerge?