30 years of Apostroph An interview with CEO Philipp Meier

What have been the greatest challenges and successes in recent years?

First of all, certainly the successful acquisition of nine smaller companies in Switzerland. Buying companies is one thing; integrating them purposefully and successfully is quite another. We have succeeded in merging our five Swiss sites so that we have one team sharing the culture, goals and processes. This is how, in combination with organic growth, we have systematically increased our market share in Switzerland.

Secondly, it has always been crucial for us to find the best tools for Apostroph. The last 15 years in particular have been shaped by far-reaching technological changes. At an early stage, we commissioned our growing IT department with the development of ERP, customer and freelancer tools as well as the optimisation of processes. The combination of talent and tools certainly points us in the right direction.

Your company has experienced incredible growth over the last three decades. Which strategies have contributed most to this success?

Well, it’s not my company (grins), but yes, I have a very entrepreneurial style of leadership. When I first came to Apostroph in 2010, I quickly realised I was dealing with fantastic people, fantastic customers and a well-organised business. A really great business case. But it was also clear that Apostroph had to grow to reach a critical size. Apostroph was already a gem in 2010. But the question at that time was: is needed to ensure it will still be a gem in 20 years’ time?

The company has come up with a lot of in-house developments in both IT and AI. What role do these technologies play in your daily work?

Our in-house developments are the reason why Apostroph, after 30 years, is still healthy, is doing well financially and can invest in pioneering topics. In other words, they are the reason why Apostroph is still a gem after all this time.

Could you give us an example of a specific IT or AI development that has really brought your company on?

Of course, there’s APOS, for example, our ERP system, generally referred to as a translation management system in the industry. And then we have the platforms for our customers – myAPOSTROPH – and also our freelancers – myFREELANCE. Then there’s apoSMART, an AI-trained tool which reads our job request e-mails and converts them into jobs in our ERP. And apoTRANSLATE plus, an online translation tool that can have dedicated client terminology and translation memories linked to it.

How important are innovation and continuous improvement in the translation sector?

I can’t speak for the sector, but I am absolutely convinced that they are absolutely vital to the survival of our company. You’ve got to remember that the gross sales price has more than halved in the last ten years both in Switzerland and in Germany. Innovation and continuous optimisation are part of our answer to that phenomenon.

How has the integration of AI and machine learning influenced the efficiency and quality of your services?

If they are used properly, AI applications can make a major difference when it comes to efficiency. This is something you will see not only when it comes to neural machine translation, but also with chatbots, in software development or, for example, when it comes to managing large amounts of data, such as an Intranet or a collection of contracts including thousands of documents.

Are there any challenges when it comes to implementing AI solutions and if so, how do you overcome them?

One perpetual issue is data protection. But we now have a range of solutions for this – to suit the particular customer requirements. What I find far more crucial is the fact that this usually concerns models that have several dependencies. For example, the database, its quality, the training of the models and lots more. We address each project as a new use case. However, this means that we don’t know exactly what the outcome will be before we have implemented it (grins).

What do you think the future holds for the translation sector in general and for your company more specifically?

I remain optimistic for everyone in the sector who systematically digitises and automates their processes and has the critical size. Cost efficiency is just as essential as broad coverage of customer requirements. The ideal collaboration between humans and machines plays a central role here. And this is precisely where our strength lies. We have a fantastic IT department with both software and AI specialists, but we also have in-house language professionals who can make the difference depending on the requirements.

What are your long-term targets and visions for the company in the next 10 to 20 years?

We are very strongly focused on our target market, on our customers and their needs. This is currently an amazing help as the last two years have been extremely difficult for the sector. We want to continue to pursue this path, which is transforming us ever more into an IT company, while just ten years ago we were still a traditional translation agency.

What motivates you every day to give your all and drive the company forward?

A successful future for the company and the employees – we have a fantastic team! And, of course, the customers – and, incidentally, that also keeps the shareholders satisfied in the long term. Alongside the daily business, it is my job to do my best to anticipate the challenges tomorrow will bring and initiate the solutions in good time.

Is there anything you would like to share with the readers?

It has always been important to ask who has written a text – a politician, a neighbour or a friend. Today, you should also ask yourself whether it was a human or a machine.