Basque Government Boosts Language Diversity with AI-Powered Translation on Red Hat OpenShift
About
EJIE, the Basque Government's IT agency, leveraged Red Hat® OpenShift® as the foundational platform for its Itzuli project. OpenShift provided a robust, AI-ready environment supporting containerized applications and crucial GPU capabilities. This enabled the development of a neural machine translation tool for Basque, Spanish, French, and English, promoting language diversity and accessibility. Red Hat Consulting and Red Hat Technical Account Management (TAM) teams provided expert guidance, ensuring a smooth adoption of advanced technologies like Kubernetes for AI workloads. Other Red Hat technologies like Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform were also part of EJIE's broader IT strategy.
The Challenge
What went wrong
The Basque Government, through EJIE, aimed to promote language diversity and inclusion within its 2.2 million population, where both Spanish and the ancient Basque language are official. An existing rule-based translation tool, developed in 2014, was limited; it could translate short sentences effectively but struggled with longer, complex texts. "The previous application... could translate short sentences well but not long texts correctly," stated Estibaliz Alkorta Barragán, Basque Minister for Culture and Language Policy. EJIE sought a modern, AI-powered automated translation solution capable of handling Spanish, French, and English to Basque and vice-versa. This presented two key challenges: developing advanced language capabilities and building the underlying technical infrastructure, particularly the AI elements. The project critically required Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) for rapid parallel processing vital for AI development, along with expertise in Kubernetes and container orchestration for GPU integration.
Solution Approach
How it was solved
EJIE adopted a philosophy of combining advanced technology with an open culture, deciding to integrate containers and GPUs for AI deployment. Recognizing the novelty of these capabilities within the Kubernetes ecosystem, EJIE collaborated closely with Red Hat Consulting and Red Hat Technical Account Management (TAM) teams. Together, they identified Red Hat OpenShift as the ideal platform. Red Hat OpenShift became the foundation of EJIE’s modern IT infrastructure, uniquely supporting the combination of containers and GPUs – critical for developing the AI-powered neural translator. The Red Hat GPU Operator simplified the integration of GPUs within OpenShift. Adopting OpenShift also accelerated DevOps processes, reducing costs and freeing EJIE staff to focus on high-value activities. The shift to a product-oriented development methodology enhanced the speed and reliability of deploying critical services, empowering development teams with greater autonomy and clear visibility into production environments. This agile, microservices-based approach allowed Itzuli to flexibly meet citizen needs.
Results Achieved
Success Metrics
By leveraging Red Hat solutions, EJIE and the Basque Government successfully launched two versions of the Itzuli neural machine translator: a general version for daily use and a specialized version for legal and administrative tasks. The impact on language accessibility and digital transformation has been profound:
- Over 30,000 people use the translator daily, with single-day peak queries reaching over 260,000.
- Usage has increased by 300% within just three years. Quarterly translation requests surged from 2 million in early 2020 to over 6.7 million by August 2023.
- The mobile application has been installed by over 60,000 individuals.
- Official translation requests for Basque Government services have decreased by 40% over the past three years, signaling both successful digital transformation and widespread trust in the tool.
Citizens now have greater freedom to manage their work and personal lives in both Basque and Spanish, facilitating daily activities, from professional tasks to children's education. EJIE is also piloting Itzuli for automated court proceeding transcription and plans to expand OpenShift use for other projects like a digital wallet.
Verified Testimonials
Real voices from people who witnessed this story firsthand
Xabier Arrieta
👔 Minister of Information Technology and Telecommunications
🏢 Basque government
We have successfully completed the migration between Red Hat OpenShift versions without affecting the services provided by Itzuli. This is a real advantage compared to traditional solutions.
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