- Appen is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange and runs a network of about 1 million contributors in more than 500 languages.
- The end of its Google contract was the main reason first-half 2024 revenue fell 18.4% to $113.4 million.
- It is a long-established option for multilingual collection and annotation.
- Type
- Data collection and annotation vendor
- Listing
- Australian Securities Exchange, ticker APX
- Network
- About 1 million contractors in more than 500 languages, serving over 100 companies
- H1 2024 revenue
- $113.4 million, down 18.4% year on year
- Buys data from companies?
- Primarily collects and annotates to order
What Appen does
Appen collects and annotates data for AI developers through a large crowd of contractors. In its first half of 2024 it reported group revenue of $113.4 million, down 18.4%, mainly because Google ended its contract. Excluding Google, revenue fell 1.5% and its China and product business grew (Staffing Industry Analysts).
Where it fits
Appen's strength is breadth: many languages, many locales and the ability to recruit people to record speech or label data to a specification. That makes it relevant to multilingual and low-resource language data and speech and audio data projects.
How it compares with a data broker
A collection vendor creates new data to order. Licensing existing data is often faster and gives more natural examples, because the data came from real work rather than a task brief. The two can complement each other: licensed data for scale, commissioned data to fill gaps.
Things to check before you sign
- How contributors consent to the use of their voice, image or writing, and whether consent covers model training.
- Customer concentration risk: what happens to your project if the vendor loses a large client.
- Quality controls and how rework is priced.
- Where data is stored and who can access it.
Alternatives and related companies
Questions
Why did Appen's revenue fall in 2024?
Staffing Industry Analysts reported that the termination of its Google contract was the primary driver of an 18.4% fall in first-half revenue.