Imagine if your content workflows could think for themselves…

What’s the real blocker to content transformation in global enterprises? It’s not strategy. It’s not budget. It’s the tangled mess of systems that don’t talk to each other.

Localization teams wait on engineering. Marketing waits on localization. Product waits on everything.

But what if none of them had to wait at all?

That’s the vision behind Blackbird – a content workflow automation platform that’s built for complexity but designed to make your life simpler. RWS is now exploring a potential integration between Blackbird and Tridion, which could help customers automate content operations across their entire ecosystem. The early signs are promising.

Why automation needs a new kind of engine

Blackbird sits in the workflow automation and iPaaS (integration platform as a service) category, but its strength lies in how it’s tuned specifically for content.

Most traditional automation tools are built around general business logic or IT workflows. They’re great for routing finance approvals or CRM updates. But content is messier. It’s multilayered, multilingual, and deeply human.

Blackbird gets that. It connects with more than 150 applications across the content lifecycle - from CMS and TMS platforms like Contentful and Trados, to communication tools like Slack and Outlook, to AI services, project tracking platforms, and analytics tools like Google Analytics.

That means you’re not just moving files from A to B. You’re building smart, end-to-end workflows that include human input, machine translation, AI evaluation, content repurposing, and publication, all in one place.

And while a native Tridion connector doesn’t exist yet, both teams see a strong opportunity to explore it – particularly around Tridion Docs and the DXD delivery layer.

Making localization automatic, not manual

During a recent session with the Tridion team, Blackbird demoed a simple but powerful use case: automating the localization pipeline with what they call a “Bird” – a visual, configurable workflow that can span multiple tools and trigger different actions based on business logic.

Here’s how one Bird might work:

• When content is marked as ready in a CMS, the Bird picks it up automatically.
• It prepares the file in the right format (HTML, for compatibility with CAT tools).
• It sends the file to a machine translation engine (e.g. DeepL).
• If the content hits a certain threshold in Google Analytics (say, more than 5,000 page views), the Bird can reroute it to human translation instead - automatically creating a project in Trados or another TMS.
• Once translation is complete, the Bird pulls the target file and pushes it back to the CMS for publication.

And because Birds can wait for events, not just execute on schedules, they’re ideal for complex content flows that involve both machines and humans - like project manager approvals in JIRA, SEO reviews, or localization QA.

Why it could work well with Tridion

Tridion customers are no strangers to complexity. Many manage multilingual content across dozens of markets, integrate with multiple translation and review systems, and maintain compliance in highly regulated industries.

Blackbird helps solve a recurring problem: how to glue together all the different pieces of the content supply chain without drowning in custom code or expensive middleware.

There’s a strong overlap here:

• Tridion provides the structured content foundation - for managing content reuse, translation workflows, governance, and omnichannel publishing.
• Blackbird adds flexible orchestration - to help teams build cross-functional workflows without relying on engineering.

It’s a promising fit for customers who want more automation, but need it to work with their specific mix of tools and stakeholders.

Beyond translation: unlocking new use cases

While the platform is strongest in localization right now, the opportunities go well beyond that.

• SEO teams can be notified automatically when new content goes live, and push SEO-enriched content back into Tridion.
• Marketing teams can use AI to generate channel-specific variants - like shorter social media versions or campaign copy.
• Support teams can integrate publishing workflows with CRM platforms or support portals.

And with RWS’s delivery platform (DXD) in the mix, there’s real potential to power smarter content delivery across websites, portals, and more.

What’s next?

Tridion and Blackbird are now exploring what an integration could look like – starting with Tridion Docs and the DXD delivery layer. The goal is to build out preconfigured templates (or as Blackbird calls them, “Eggs”) for common Tridion-based scenarios.

In one scenario, you could have an Egg that automatically picks up newly approved content from Tridion Docs, sends it to Trados for human translation, waits for the translated files, and then publishes them to DXD - triggering notifications in JIRA or Slack along the way.

Instead of building that workflow from scratch, a Tridion user could simply grab the Egg, plug in their credentials, tweak the steps, and hit go.

It’s still early days, but the direction is clear. Blackbird could give Tridion customers a new superpower: the ability to automate content workflows across their entire stack, no matter how many systems are involved.

That’s good news for anyone still wasting hours each week converting files, chasing updates, or stitching together systems by hand.

Want to see smarter workflows in action?

Blackbird connects the dots across your content stack. Explore the tech, meet the team, and dive deeper into the docs.

Or, you can discover how Tridion helps you create, manage and deliver content at scale - with structure, speed and consistency.

Interested in joining forces?

Take a look at the Tridion partner ecosystem and see how to become part of a global network of innovators.