Hope Research Group (HRG) collects speech, video, image, and text data for machine learning teams across Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Aruba, Curaçao, Saint Lucia, Barbados, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Suriname, Guyana, Belize, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Argentina, and Brazil.
We have been running field research in these markets since 1985. Since 2023 we have been applying that infrastructure to AI training data collection for frontier AI labs, enterprise ML teams, vendor-network aggregators, and sovereign AI programs including Latam-GPT.
We do not do synthetic data, model-generated data, or scraped web data. Every record has a real person behind it, an informed consent record attached to it, and a chain of custody from the recording device to final delivery.
Caribbean. Jamaica (Jamaican Patois, Jamaican Standard English), Trinidad and Tobago (Trinidadian English Creole, Trinidadian Hindi and Bhojpuri, Trinidadian Standard English), Aruba and Curaçao (Papiamento, Dutch, Spanish, English), Saint Lucia (Saint Lucian Creole French, English), Barbados (Bajan Creole, English), Dominican Republic (Dominican Spanish), Puerto Rico (Puerto Rican Spanish, English), Haiti (Haitian Creole and French, subject to per-project security assessment), Suriname (Sranan Tongo, Dutch, Sarnami Hindustani), Guyana (Guyanese Creole English, English), Belize (Belizean Creole, English, Spanish).
Latin America mainland. Mexico (Mexican Spanish including regional variants), Colombia (Colombian Spanish, Colombian Portuguese in border regions), Peru (Peruvian Spanish, Quechua, Aymara, with indigenous language collection subject to community consent protocols), Chile (Chilean Spanish, Mapudungun), Argentina (Rioplatense Spanish), Brazil (Brazilian Portuguese and regional variants).
| Country | Languages collected | Modalities available | Typical lead time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jamaica | Jamaican Patois, Jamaican Standard English | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Trinidad and Tobago | Trinidadian English Creole, Trinidadian Hindi/Bhojpuri, Standard English | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Aruba and Curaçao | Papiamento, Dutch, Spanish, English | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
| Saint Lucia | Saint Lucian Creole French, English | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
| Barbados | Bajan Creole, English | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Dominican Republic | Dominican Spanish | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Puerto Rico | Puerto Rican Spanish, English | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Haiti | Haitian Creole, French | Speech, video, image, text (subject to security assessment) | 4 to 6 weeks |
| Suriname | Sranan Tongo, Dutch, Sarnami Hindustani | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
| Guyana | Guyanese Creole English, English | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
| Belize | Belizean Creole, English, Spanish | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
| Mexico | Mexican Spanish (regional variants) | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Colombia | Colombian Spanish, Colombian Portuguese (border) | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Peru | Peruvian Spanish, Quechua, Aymara | Speech, video, image, text (indigenous subject to community protocols) | 4 to 6 weeks |
| Chile | Chilean Spanish, Mapudungun | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Argentina | Rioplatense Spanish | Speech, video, image, text | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Brazil | Brazilian Portuguese and regional variants | Speech, video, image, text | 3 to 5 weeks |
Coverage in any market means we have an active field coordinator on the ground, a recruiter network built over multiple projects, and workable venue relationships. It does not mean we have every dialect and every quota-splittable subpopulation on tap. On a brief-by-brief basis we will tell you honestly what a market can and cannot deliver at the volumes you need in the timeline you have.
Every project moves through the same five stages.
48 to 72 hour feasibility assessment per market.
30 to 40 percent over-recruit for remote, 15 to 20 for on-site.
Project-specific consent form, archived with participant ledger.
Self-record on participant device or on-site with HRG coordinator.
First-pass QA, batch manifest, quota-progress report per delivery.
Global AI training data platforms have thin or zero field coverage for most of what HRG delivers.
| Language or demographic | HRG coverage | Typical global vendor coverage | Estimated share of major LLM training corpora |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jamaican Patois | Full field collection | Little to none | < 0.1% |
| Trinidadian English Creole | Full field collection | Little to none | < 0.1% |
| Papiamento | Full field collection | None known | < 0.05% |
| Haitian Creole | Field collection (with security assessment) | Limited | < 0.1% |
| Sranan Tongo | Full field collection | None known | < 0.05% |
| Guyanese Creole | Full field collection | Little to none | < 0.1% |
| Indo-Caribbean facial data | Full field collection | Systematically undersampled | Not measured |
| Caribbean Spanish variants (DR, PR, Cuba) | Full field collection | Bundled as "LatAm Spanish" | Included in ~4% Spanish share |
| Rioplatense Spanish | Full field collection | Often bundled | Included in ~4% Spanish share |
| Andean Quechua and Aymara | Field collection (community protocols) | Academic only | < 0.01% |
| Brazilian Portuguese regional variants | Full field collection, split by variant | Usually one bucket | Included in ~2% Portuguese share |
Corpus share estimates cite CAF, CENIA/Latam-GPT publications, and the CreoleVal benchmark.
Enterprise ML teams and frontier AI labs building foundation models, speech systems, and computer vision models with regional coverage requirements.
Vendor-network aggregators, the specialist data collection firms who need country-vendor partners for specific markets. On these engagements HRG is the field partner and the aggregator manages the client relationship, platform, and QA. Standard commercial terms apply.
Regional AI programs and academic partnerships including Latam-GPT, CENIA, and equivalent sovereign AI initiatives in the region, plus university-led NLP and computer vision research programmes where field-collected data is the bottleneck.
An honest limit
HRG is a field research firm. We do not do model training, annotation platform hosting, or large-scale offshore annotation of pre-collected data. If your brief needs field collection plus a downstream annotation pipeline running at scale, we will collect and hand off to your annotation partner rather than take that piece on ourselves. Buyers who need a single vendor covering both should look at the enterprise generalists (TELUS Digital, Sama, iMerit), with the caveat that most of them do not have on-the-ground field infrastructure in the markets HRG covers.
HRG collects Papiamento speech data in Aruba and Curaçao. Standard collection modalities include read speech, spontaneous dialogue, and telephony-conditioned audio. We can also collect Papiamento written text and translation pairs.
HRG has active field infrastructure in Trinidad and Tobago covering Trinidadian English Creole, Trinidadian Standard English, Trinidadian Hindi and Bhojpuri variants, and video, image, and speech modalities. Other regional research firms operate in Trinidad but few have adapted their infrastructure specifically to AI training data collection.
The Caribbean provides genuinely diverse facial and video training data because the region's population is a mix of Afro-Caribbean, Indo-Caribbean, mixed heritage, and smaller European-descended communities. HRG collects video and image data across these subpopulations at quota-controlled ratios specified in the brief. For demographic bias mitigation in computer vision models, Caribbean collection is one of the highest-value regional sources available.
Mexican Spanish, Rioplatense (Argentine and Uruguayan) Spanish, Chilean Spanish, Colombian Spanish, Peruvian Spanish, Andean Quechua and Aymara (subject to community protocols), Brazilian Portuguese and its regional variants, and Guaraní in bordering regions.
Every participant signs a project-specific consent form naming the collector, the data controller (the client, named), the intended use of the data, the retention period, and the participant's right of withdrawal. HRG archives consent forms for the contract-specified retention period and maintains a consent-record ledger cross-referencing each participant ID to their signed form.
HRG collects. If a project requires downstream annotation, model-in-the-loop QA, or platform-hosted labelling at scale, HRG hands off to your annotation partner. We do not run large-scale annotation operations.
Depends on volume, modality, and quota complexity. As a rough band: 500 to 1,500 participants across two to three modest-sized markets runs 4 to 6 weeks; 5,000 or more participants across multiple markets with tight demographic quotas runs 10 to 16 weeks; sovereign or academic partnerships with staged delivery run 6 to 12 months. Scoping conversation on request.
HRG is led by Managing Director Kurt Wedderburn, based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The firm operates as HOPE Enterprises USA LLC with offices in Florida, Jamaica, and Trinidad, plus remote coordinators across the Latin American mainland. Firm founded 1985.
Managing Director, HRG. Field research across the Caribbean and Latin America since 1985.
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