Commercial success for ADAPT and DCU spin-out Iconic

13 January 2021
Commercial success for ADAPT and DCU spin-out Iconic

ADAPT and DCU spin-out Iconic Translation Machines Ltd. (“Iconic”) today announced that it has been acquired by RWS Holdings plc (“RWS”), a world-leading provider of translation and localization, intellectual property support solutions and life sciences language services.

Iconic is a software provider specialising in the development of best-in-class neural machine translation (NMT) solutions adapted for specific industries and blue-chip clients. Recently Iconic has been working closely with the RWS Life Sciences division, delivering NMT solutions to RWS’s pharmaceutical clients. Iconic will form a new vertical language technology business within RWS and will be led by its co-founder’s Dr John Tinsley and ADAPT’s Associate Director Dr Páraic Sheridan.

Speaking today on the acquisition Dr. Páraic Sheridan said:

“As co-founders of Iconic, we have worked extremely hard to make our company and team what it is today. We have been really impressed with the high calibre of people at RWS to date and believe this is the perfect place to continue the development of our vision.”

ADAPT Centre Director Professor Vinny Wade said:

“ADAPT wishes to congratulate Páraic and the Iconic team on this fantastic news. The commercial success of the Centre’s spinout companies like Iconic demonstrates the economic impact of  Academic and Industry collaboration and follows on from a proven track record in the  commercialisation of ADAPT’s world-class research in digital media technologies.”

Dr. Páraic Sheridan will be leaving his current role as Associate Director at ADAPT to take up the role of co-Managing Director of Iconic as a division of RWS Group.

ADAPT also commercialises its world-class research in digital media technologies through collaborative research with industry and has several start-up teams at exciting stages in their development. For more detail and to learn about investment opportunities in these start-ups visit  and https://showcase.adaptcentre.ie/ and  http://adaptcentre.ie/startups

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