Spoken

What Spoken does

Spoken Oy is a Finnish language services company founded in 2014 by Johanna and Jukka Ihatsu and headquartered in Helsinki (originally Joensuu), providing professional subtitling, transcription, translation, proofreading, and AI-assisted data analysis. The company serves thousands of customers across Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Germany, with primary end markets including video production companies, universities and researchers, law firms, public sector bodies needing EAA-compliant accessibility subtitling, and corporate communications teams. Named customers include the University of Helsinki, DLA Piper Finland, City of Lahti, Työterveyslaitos, Löytö Studio, and AFRY.

The core technology is the proprietary browser-based Spoken TOOL platform, hosted on Google Cloud infrastructure in the EU region, which enables approximately 250 part-time project assistants to work remotely without downloading customer materials. Automatic speech recognition models (Whisper or equivalent) are run in-house within Spoken's own managed environment rather than via third-party APIs, with raw transcripts then reviewed by professional linguists. Customers interact through a self-service upload portal (tool.spoken.fi/upload), a customer account area, and a quote request system for custom projects; an August 2024 release added a customer self-edit view for transcripts and subtitles. AI-assisted data analysis (aineistoanalyysi) extends the platform into LLM-supported qualitative research work, and a separate Spoken ONLINE sub-brand offers pure AI subtitling.

Spoken's business model is professional services delivered through a hybrid AI + human production process, priced per unit (e.g., per minute of video) with pay-as-you-go billing, a 100% surcharge for express next-business-day delivery, and custom quotes for enterprise projects. GTM is primarily direct-to-consumer and self-serve via the website and blog-led content marketing, supplemented by inside-sales quote handling and LinkedIn presence. Revenue was €1.6M in FY2022 on a base of only 4 full-time employees and ~250 freelance project assistants; the company is privately held by the Ihatsu founders with no external funding or institutional investment.

Name

Spoken

Legal name

Spoken Oy

Website

https://spoken.fi

Company type

Private

Founded year

2014

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

101–250 employees

Short description

Spoken Oy is a Finnish language services company offering human-reviewed and AI-assisted subtitling, transcription, translation, and proofreading via its proprietary Spoken TOOL platform, serving video producers, universities, law firms, and public sector clients across six European countries.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Language Services

NAICS

Translation and Interpretation Services (541930)

SIC

Services-Motion Picture & Video Tape Production (7812)

akta.pro primary industry

Multilingual Multimedia Localization (Subtitling, Dubbing, Voiceover) (MPAAANAH)

akta.pro secondary industries

Speech Translation & Multilingual Speech Tech (HDAAAFAE), Assistive Hearing & Communication Access (Captioning, Hearing Support, Transcription) (EDAFAKAC)

Keywords

• Transcription services
• Subtitling services
• Translation services
• Language proofreading
• AI speech recognition

Headquarters

HQ city

Helsinki

HQ country

Finland

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Professional language services: Spoken generates revenue through providing professional language services including subtitling, transcription, translation, and proofreading. Services are priced based on project scope (e.g., video duration for subtitling). The company reported 1.6 M€ in revenue last year.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Spoken provides professional subtitling, transcription, translation, and language proofreading services for audio and video content. The company operates a hybrid delivery model: AI-based automatic speech recognition generates raw transcripts and subtitles in-house on EU-based Google Cloud infrastructure, and professional linguists or native speakers review, correct, and finalize the output. Customers can also purchase pure AI-only output without human review for faster, lower-cost delivery.

Product overview

Spoken is a language services company offering a portfolio of subtitling, transcription, proofreading, and translation services. The core portfolio is organized along two delivery modes: professional human-produced services and AI-assisted services. Human-produced subtitling ( tekstitys) and professional transcription (litterointi) are delivered by experienced linguists via the Spoken TOOL browser-based platform. AI subtitling and AI transcription leverage automatic speech recognition (ASR) in Spoken's own managed environment, with outputs either delivered unedited or refined by a human professional. A customer self-service editing view within Spoken TOOL allows clients to make their own edits to delivered transcripts and subtitles. Additional services include language proofreading (kielentarkistus) and translation (käännös), with an AI-assisted data analysis (aineistoanalyysi) module that combines LLM tools with expert human analysts. File submission is handled through the Spoken Upload portal. The company operates in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and the Netherlands.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Spoken TOOL: Customer portal and editing tool for managing transcription and subtitling projects
• Spoken ONLINE

Products and services

• Professional (human-produced) subtitling Human-generated subtitling where experienced subtitlers create timed, accurate subtitles for videos, ensuring full compliance with accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1) and producing standard subtitle formats such as SRT or VTT.
• AI subtitling

Quantifiable outcome

• Videos with subtitles are 40% more likely to be watched to completion
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers12 records

Segments5 records

Ideal customer profiles5 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability6 records

Feature3 records

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Rev: Rev is a US-based direct competitor offering human and AI transcription, captioning, and subtitling services to a broad SMB and enterprise customer base. It overlaps Spoken's core offering across both delivery modes (human-verified and AI-only) and competes for similar use cases (video, podcast, legal).
• 3Play Media: 3Play Media is a US specialist in closed captioning, subtitling, and transcription with strong accessibility-compliance positioning. It is a direct competitor to Spoken's subtitling and accessibility offerings, serving enterprise media, higher education, and government buyers.
• Verbit: Verbit provides AI-powered transcription and captioning combined with human reviewers for legal, education, and media verticals. It is a direct competitor to Spoken's hybrid AI-plus-human transcription and captioning workflow, with a similar premium-tier positioning.
• GoTranscript: GoTranscript is a global transcription and translation services provider operating with a distributed freelancer model, similar to Spoken's project-assistant structure. It directly competes for human-produced transcription and translation projects at similar price points.
• Trint: Trint is an AI transcription platform with an editor workflow that produces shareable transcripts and exports for journalists, researchers, and content teams. It overlaps with Spoken's AI-assisted transcription and self-service editing experience delivered through Spoken TOOL.
• SubtitleBee: SubtitleBee is an AI-driven subtitle generator targeting video creators and marketers with auto-subtitling and translation features. It competes directly with Spoken's AI subtitling product and increasingly with the human-verified tier for shorter-form content.
• CaptionHub: CaptionHub offers a cloud-based platform combining automated speech recognition with collaborative editing for broadcast and enterprise video subtitling. It overlaps with Spoken TOOL's workflow positioning and competes for video-production buyers.

Emerging players

• Otter.ai: Otter.ai is a pure-AI meeting and conversation transcription product focused on real-time use cases rather than post-hoc professional subtitling. It overlaps with Spoken's AI transcription tier but targets a different buyer (individual/team SaaS subscription rather than project-based services).
• Descript: Descript is an AI-powered audio/video editing platform with built-in transcription and overdub features serving podcasters and video creators. It is an emerging player that overlaps with Spoken's transcription offering and increasingly competes for creator and SMB subtitling workflows.

Broad incumbents

• Lionbridge: Lionbridge is a large incumbent translation and localization services provider offering subtitling, interpretation, and AI data services globally. It is a broad incumbent that overlaps with Spoken's translation and subtitling service lines but operates at significantly larger scale across many more languages and markets.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/spoken-oy
• Facebookfacebook.com/spokenoy

Compliance2 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Spoken