ES: How good is the language interpretation industry in India? Where is it required and what are its hot segments?
Ram: The Language Interpretation Industry across the globe has been accepted and respected as one of the most important elements of any meeting. And in India the trend has been extremely encouraging. With our Prime Minister establishing strong ties across the globe, it is but natural that we have seen strong growth of Interpretation requirement-equipment and professionals, both in International events as well as domestic events.
ES: Please tell us about your role in the organisation
Ram: Being the Founder and Prop of my company, my role is essentially to charter short term and long term strategy for the organization. I am actively involved in Overall growth strategy, Marketing plans, Resourcing of Equipment and Manpower. I am also constantly working on identifying new business and new revenue generation opportunities.ES: Please share with us about your journey so far with key achievements?
Ram: Last one decade has been extremely challenging and exciting for me as an entrepreneur. While on one side we have been able to augment our inventory – from analogue to digital equipment, investing in high end equipment like BOSCH, Senheisser, imported Interpretation booths, etc. We have also established offices in all the major metros – getting even closer to our customers, reducing the cost of operations, establishing stock points and technical team. Thus reducing travel and cargo etc. And we have been handling some of the most critical and prestigious events – not only for us but these events had India’s prestige at stake.
Some of those include:
15th August India speech by PM, providing live interpretation services since last 4 years.
IAFS summit 2015 – Indo Afro summit- Congregation of 54 head states with their entourage held at New Delhi.
We provided interpretation across two location, setting up a document centre working 24 x 7 with language translation, proof reader, guides ensuring the delegate and their discussions had relevant content.
The BRICS summit kept us busy throughout the year with culmination at GOA, where we provided Interpretation services across multiple locations.
Some other events included those of FIFA, PPD- DHAKA, ASEAN , Int Solar Alliance ( ISA) , SAP teched 2017, Noable Laureate summit at Rashtrapati Bhavan, etc.
Not to forget – AGM of African Development Bank and Meeting of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank- AIIB.
ES: What is the significance of these products and how do they add value in Events?
Ram: All our services are an important and critical success area for the events.
- Interpretation services are extremely important for ensuring that the participants – irrespective of their background and language limitations – are able to participate in the proceeding of the meetings; be it
- dealers meet, technical discussions or International agencies and govt. bodies coming together to pen down key policies and decrees. Similarly Silent Conference services ensures that you can have multiple events, breakaway sessions without adding on to the infrastructure, logistics and encourage more interactions and participation.
- Our ARS – Audience Response System is an extremely effective tool to increase interactivity with the speaker.
- Tour Guide systems helps be mobile and effective communication in noisy shop floor areas.
ES: How good is the language interpretation industry in India? Where is it required and what are its hot segments?
Ram: The Language Interpretation Industry across the globe has been accepted and respected as one of the most important elements of any meeting. And in India the trend has been extremely encouraging. With our Prime Minister establishing strong ties across the globe, it is but natural that we have seen strong growth of Interpretation requirement-equipment and professionals, both in International events as well as domestic events.ES: What are the Emerging trends?
Ram: As with all industries Simultaneous Interpretation is bound to see changes with regard to how the services get delivered. Lots of behind the scenes research and application development is going on. Cloud based solutions, where in the Interpretation equipment is located at city A and the Interpreters at city B, all at different locations are providing services for an event which is being held at City C. So effectively increasing the efficiency, higher utilizations of resources, reducing logistics – travel, hotel, cargo etc., and overall more cheaper solutions.
Along with that, there are lots of Apps being developed which will challenge stand alone Voting pads, as these response systems will be running through your local WiFi, Cloud based on your mobiles. So you can expect a lot of Software interventions.ES: Can you share with us any innovation introduced by you?
Ram: When I entered the business of Simultaneous Interpretation – the services were for those FEW who COULD afford it. With my model along with innovative use of technologies and developing a large pool of professional interpreters, Interpretation services are now being used by NGOs, Small Dealers Meets, Roundtable Conferences, Religious gatherings and even Red Fort (where nobody had even thought of it).ES: Can you share with us any case study on how Impactful your products are?
Ram: Since 2009 we have been providing Simultaneous Interpretation Equipment services to HERBALIFE INDIA , one of the World’s largest health and nutrition company. While it started with 2-3 language translations for about 2000 delegates once a year, it has now grown to annually 5 large size delegate meets holding 5000 to 17000 delegates with over 9 language translations. Along with these Mega events, there are regional Herbalife meets across various cities for 500 to 1000 delegates. These smaller events are being held every month throughout the year.
Such Phenomenal and consistent growth of one single account speaks volumes about the business and growth strategy of HERBALIFE in India. In other words, Interpretation is one of the KEY SUCCESS AREAS for Herbalife’s India growth.ES: How do you view the Exhibition and Convention Industry and its future?
Ram: India still happens to be the most important destination for all and every kind of services and manufacturing, along with the largest middle class population. In effect, Exhibitions of new products, manufacturing, interaction with global market, Make in INDIA push, Digital India, MICE.. all of these will have a very positive impact on the convention industries….I feel there will be huge demand for Large Convention halls and Exhibitions.ES: What are your upcoming plans?
Ram: To bring in more Digital based and software based solutions in India which are more in line with our PMs DIGITAL INDIA visions. One of the areas we are working on is DIGITAL DISPLAYS in small and large format. This is being done considering that Plastic- Flex material are being discouraged and banned at many places and soon there will be demand for an alternative and more eco-friendly method.
