Mother Tongue Writers opens in Singapore

This announcement follows on from a number of high-profile agency moves in to the country. In November 2011 alone, at least three agencies opened their Singapore doors, including Tigerspike, Millennial Media and Grass Valley.

Also among the recent movers have been mobile app-developer Appio Labs, in March and digital agency Reading Room in May.

Media strategist Naked Communications also opened up its regional headquarters for Southeast Asia in March, while content startup Mobile Now joined the Singapore fraternity in September.

Mother Tongue Writers' new office in Singapore aims to serve the agency's European clients looking for optimum quality roll out of ad campaigns and marketing communications in Asian languages, such as Chinese, Thai and Korean. It is also offering trans-creation services within the Asia Pacific region.

It will be spearheaded by James Bradley, who was with Mother Tongue Writers in London previously. Mother Tongue Writers was founded in the UK by ex-Saatchis leaders Guy Gilpin and Mirella Hogan, over 20 years ago.

“From a global perspective, many of our clients will benefit from the round the clock coverage that we are now able to offer from our offices in London, New York and now Singapore,” he added.

Mother Tongue Writers hires copywriters working in their native languages, rather than translators. With local knowledge and writing skills, it allows them to write original and culturally-relevant copy for  target markets, the company said.

“To drive a successful global campaign you just need to make sure you can’t go wrong by building in adaption and trans-creation help. Our research estimates that less than half of global companies have their end lines translated by specialists, which means plenty of scope for error,” Bradley said, adding that digital trans-creation requires a different skill set again.