Can AI Patent Translations Reduce Costs Without Compromising Quality?

By combining technology and human expertise, human-in-the-loop AI patent translation services enable IP owners to balance speed with precision. At Questel, for example, we combine advanced generative AI drafting workflows with expert review to deliver fast, accurate, enforceable patent translation services.  

Combining human and AI-based patent translation also ensures that patent owners can sidestep the key risks of AI-only translation, such as: 

• Complexity of patent language 
  Patent translations feature technical, legal, and industry-specific terminology that is not familiar to generic AI engines, while AI tools may misinterpret ambiguities and nuanced phrasing.
• Insufficient understanding of context 
  Today’s AI engines do not have the necessary depth of understanding of inventive concepts and can struggle to obtain context from the full text (e.g., from the description for the claims).
• Technical limitations 
  Patent owners are rightly wary of the risk of ‘hallucinations’ whereby AI introduces false information into the text, but AI tools may also take an isolated approach rather than ensuring inter-claim consistency due to technical limitations.
• Lack of confidentiality and risk of data leakage 
  AI platforms that are not secure could reveal details of an invention before publication, while cross-border data transfer risks can raise compliance and sovereignty concerns.
• Compliance and regulatory issues 
  Patent owners and their providers must also navigate the evolving regulatory landscape, such as the EU AI Act. 

Questel continually evaluates AI options and will incorporate any tool that makes our translators and revisers more efficient and more accurate. We leverage AI while always ensuring security and confidentiality: 
 

• AI Translation Support  
  It is unlikely that we will see LLMs trained specifically for IP translations. Rather, we are making use of RAG models and context windows, which incorporate client-specific translation memories, terminology, style guides, etc., at the time of execution to influence the output. This also has the advantage of limiting data exposure during the training process.
• Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG)  
  RAG provides the AI LLM with additional context (translation memories, terminology, style guides, etc.) that it can use to more closely align the translation with our expectations.  RAG is vital for adding to and focusing the LLMs ability to translate in a tighter context.
• Context Windows 
  Context Window describes the amount of text that an LLM can process and remember at one time, influencing its ability to generate coherent and contextually relevant responses. As with RAG, building the Context Windows is going to be critical in patent application translations. For example, we want the LLM to see the entirety of the application, thereby gaining context in the claims from the description (as opposed to taking a segment-by-segment view), building better coherence/consistency between individual claims rather than considering them in isolation.
• AI Quality Evaluation  
  We use AI quality assessment workflows to pre-approve segments and focus translator efforts on text where human expertise is required.
• AI Assisted Formatting  
  We employ pre- and post-translation automations to prepare document formatting and style to comply with foreign PTO requirements.
• AI Linguistic Assistance  
  Our interactive assistant for translators aids with proofreading, accuracy, consistency, and adherence to style guides, providing real-time feedback, flagging potential mistranslations, and suggesting improvements to maintain the quality and coherence of the final output.
• AI Compliance Check  
  We enhance final human QC with a RAG compliance check, ensuring client style, terminology, and formatting are followed, among other low-level quality assurance checks to ensure filing readiness.
• Assuring Security/Secrecy  
  All AI implementations are vetted by the Translations Platform team, Questel’s IT team, and require sign-off from the Questel Information Security team to ensure data security is never compromised.