Go east, young man
by Christian Arno, 9th June, 2006
Why a UK translation company set up business in Romania
Lingo24 was at something of a crossroads in January, 2005. It had established itself as a provider of translation services to many international companies and had operations in three countries: the UK, New Zealand, and China. Lingo24 had been launched in the UK in 2002 and, by 2005, had grown to employ approximately 6 staff. Scattered throughout the island (although with a concentration in the east of Scotland and in London) were the company’s directors and project managers. Most of Lingo’s clients were also UK-based, although, thanks to its multi-lingual website and web marketing nous, it had secured a good number of clients in Germany, Switzerland and (somewhat strangely given the lack of a Japanese language website!) Japan. Always on the lookout for competitive advantage, the company had decided it should offer its service 24 hours a day. Rather than forcing poor souls in the UK to work through the night, the company’s directors started to consider the benefits of setting up another operation abroad. New Zealand was not only in a good time zone (thirteen hours during the British winter and eleven during British summer time) but it also had an excellent infrastructure and an abundance of Asian language skills. So, in late 2003, a sister company was formed in Auckland and by April, 2004, it had grown to employ four people: one project manager, two full-time linguists, and a translation technology development officer. In late 2004, one of Lingo24’s most important customers, a travel industry behemoth, indicated there was a very good chance Lingo would win a contract to translate a large amount of tourism-focused material into simplified Chinese if it set up in China. Without too much consideration, two Lingo executives set off and, after an extremely intense three weeks, left, having recruited two project managers they deemed capable of handling a large and demanding job (which, incidentally, is ongoing). So, in January 2005, the headcount had risen to 15, demand for Lingo24’s translation services was strong and growing fast, and the company’s directors, both inexperienced but enthusiastic, realised they had a serious opportunity on their hands. They knew they could significantly expand this business because its modus operandi was extremely efficient, and there was demand for the high quality translation services they could now offer. They also knew the translation industry was (and, of course, still is) very competitive, and that they would need to develop their business further before it could grow significantly and compete for more international business. Keeping costs low would be a key consideration, as would be developing the technology to support and help manage the increase in staff they thought necessary. It was also going to be important to broaden the company’s international reach to give us access to more translators and more project managers who could assess translators’ work in their own languages. So Lingo decided on Romania! But why? As most of its customers are based in western Europe, Lingo wanted to build an operation in a similar time zone. Romania is just one hour ahead of most of western Europe, and can be reached in about 5 hours from the UK. The cost of labour is low by European standards, and yet there are many highly skilled people – particularly young people. Of utmost importance to Lingo was the availability of computer programmers to develop its management systems, and languages graduates who could be trained as project managers. After just one trip, Lingo’s director Christian Arno and CTO Jos Shepherd were sold – the people were perfect, the city was delightful, and broadband Internet access was available (albeit with less than instantaneous activation). Within a matter of months, Lingo had incorporated a Romanian company, and now, less than 18 months after Lingo’s management team first touched down on Romanian soil, the company employs thirty people full-time in a range of different roles. Romania has provided the jump-start a small company needed to become, well, a medium-sized company with real prospects of continued long term growth.
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