What is in store for Freelance Translators in 2007 and beyond?

What is in store for Freelance Translators in 2007 and beyond? I had just read a note in Babelport site which describes the development of translation markets in Europe. There are some interesting predictions for freelance translators as well. 1. European Translation market will continue to profit from the growing international trade. 2. An annual growth of 5 percent for translation services is expected. 3. The share of European companies in the international translation industry is close to 48 percent. 4. Compared to the figures of 2005, the 15 leading companies in the translation market grew their turnover by about 20% to close to 1.5b US$ in 2006. 5. The 15 largest companies in the sector are responsible for close to 12 percent of the total turnover. 6. Another 13% of the global market is owned by some 3100 translation companies. 7.The remaining 75% are the domain of roughly 200.000 freelancers. 8.For 2006, the estimate of the total market is 12.46 billion US Dollar or 9.5 billion Euro. 9. The share of freelancers, currently around 75% of the global turnover is to decrease to 60-70%. That is mainly attributed to the fact that projects become more multilingual and thus need to be handled by project managing agencies. 10. By 2010/12 a general slowdown of the growth in international trade is expected in turn having its effect on the translation sector. Most importantly, however, is the fact that translation does still not have a positive image. Clients see it more as a cost than as an investment. For reading the full story visit the Source: http://www.babelport.com/news/1953