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The Hut Group continues acquisition trail with translation company

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Cheshire-based The Hut Group (THG) has continued its acquisition trail with the purchase of a language translation company.

The online beauty and wellbeing retailer, which recently announced that sales had grown to £736m, has acquired Language Connect.

Founded in 2003 by Ben and Iwona Taylor, Language Connect has a customer base of over 900 organisations globally, including Thomson Reuters, Twenty First Century Fox and Norton Rose Fulbright, as well as several of the world’s largest market research organisations.

It also has an international footprint, with offices in London, New York, Singapore, Dubai, Munich and Melbourne.

The acquisition is intended to allow The Hut Group – which has announced plans to move most of it staff from Northwich to a 870,000 sq ft head office at Manchester Airport – to deliver a step change in its translation capabilities, supporting its continued international growth.

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Language Connect represents a “significant addition” to the company’s proprietary technology platform, THG Ingenuity.

Matthew Moulding, founder and chief executive officer, said: “In Language Connect, we have made a significant investment which supports our international growth plans; making translation more efficient for our customers around the globe.

“It also marks another step in the growth of our proprietary technology platform, THG Ingenuity, following the acquisitions of UK2 and Hangar Seven last year. We expect to make additional investments this year to grow the platform further.”

Ben Taylor, co-founder of Language Connect, added: “I have closely followed the growth of THG as one of the UK’s leading technology companies and particularly its impressive expansion into international territories. I am confident in the group’s ability to accelerate the business forward and create exceptional opportunities for our people in this exciting new chapter.”

Operating over 160 localised websites across 35 languages and 42 currencies, THG’s platform receives over 500 million visits annually.

Over the past 18 months it has acquired the likes of cosmetics brand Illamasqua, hosting company UK2, skincare and spa brand ESPA and Macclesfield agency Hangar Seven.

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