CHANGES UNDER PRESSURE

After two crazy and at times difficult weeks at thebigword I’m really looking forward to actually being able to sit in my sun drenched garden this weekend. These past two weeks have included our annual conference, where we were able to share our future plans with our teams from around the world, including information about our exceptional technology developments. Our investment in technology is really driving forward a number of exciting wins.

So, what’s different this year from other years? Well, truly this year we have experienced huge pressure on pricing from both Governments and the private sector and to be quite honest I don’t think it would have been possible to compete without three very important ingredients. First, our linguists, second, our dedicated team –many of whom spend their lives travelling away from family and home working in locations around the world and third, the technology, and our significant and on-going investment in that technology, that’s allowing us to deliver a world-class service to our customers.

The challenge for us, in common not only with other companies but indeed other countries, is delivering a world-class service in this present economic environment. We see a great number of indications that the economies are improving and the private sector is gaining more confidence than we've seen in a long time. The plan is therefore maintaining an affordable service in this economy to ensure a sustainable on-going business. I am truly proud at how our many stakeholders are working with us.

What do we believe the future holds? Well, the next 18 months to two years we believe that there will be continued pressure on price. One interesting fact that recent surveys we have undertaken show, is that companies are not translating and interpreting all of their work. In fact, the majority of companies we spoke to believe that if they had the financial resources, they would double their translation spend so; again the challenge for our industry is to be ready for the boom. We estimate this will be in the next two years.

Part of the answer will be Technology, which will aid with the delivery of the work.  We will also see a huge upturn in our sector as the ability to buy from overseas, especially via the web, increases (and it is already increasing exponentially)

So for linguists, who have seen and continue to see decreases in rates as we see the huge pressure on prices, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Talking of light and sunshine, take care in the hot sun and I look forward to catching up with you next week.

Larry