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Translating the name of a business

 

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  #1  
Old September 26, 2011, 12:39 PM
lblanco lblanco is offline
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Translating the name of a business

Hello,
I am having a debate with someone at work about whether its proper to translate the name of a business. I say no, a business name should not be translated. Please give me your thoughts.

Thank you!
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  #2  
Old September 26, 2011, 01:05 PM
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Business names are generally not translated. I've seen many articles written in Spanish that talk about Lexmark, IBM, Apple, Lotus, UPS, Toshiba, Sony, Prada, etc., without providing the reader with a translation.
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Old September 26, 2011, 01:25 PM
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In principle, I'd only leave proper names in English:
·La financiera McGraw Hill
·La calificadora Standard y Poor's
.La empresa Coca-Cola
...

However, it's hard to stick to such style, and usually in the press the whole business names are left as they originally are in English:
·McGraw Hill Financial
·Standard and Poor's / Standard & Poor's
·Coca-Cola Company
·Accuvest Global Advisors
...
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Old September 27, 2011, 10:36 AM
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If the name is difficult to pronounce, for the English speakers at least, it's translated. Example: Medecins sans frontieres becomes Doctors Without Borders.
Red Cross becomes Cruz Roja among Spanish speakers I know. Maybe the rule changes for charities, because Blue Cross heath insurance is Blue Cross for Spanish speakers too.
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Old September 27, 2011, 11:04 AM
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As a general rule, proper names should not be translated. This includes names of people, businesses, places, companies, etc. However, where convention has already established a translation, it can be used, e.g. Sevilla => Seville. I'm sure there are also some cases where it would make sense to translated a proper name.

When an organization or company has an official presence in several countries, they often decide how their name appears in different languages.
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Old September 27, 2011, 01:35 PM
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With organisations (other than really well known ones like the UN / ONU, NATO / OTAN, etc), in newspapers I often see a translated name, followed by e.g. "(ABBR, de sus siglas en inglés)", and then ABBR being used for the rest of the article.
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Old September 28, 2011, 02:52 PM
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I'm agree with the Rusty's answer.
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Old October 02, 2011, 08:05 PM
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Business names should not be translated...

Acronyms on the other hand (PJT) can be translated with an entry of the English initials (siglas en inglés).

My
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