Guest column: Ella Turner of K7 Media on opening up in mainland Europe, post Brexit
K7 Media’s translation manager talks about why the media consultancy, which works with some of the world’s biggest TV broadcasters, production groups and distributors, opened an office in Holland in March on the back of increasing demand from international clients and the imminent effect of Brexit.
The UK’s triggering of article 50 to begin the process of exiting the EU and the uncertain economic climate this created forced K7 to look abroad, and we believe it was a logical next step to create a physical presence on the continent.
This international outlook aligns with changes in the TV landscape. As the world of television and digital content becomes ever more globalised there will be a rolling back of the importance of English-language programming as countries focus on original language content which reflects the issues which are relevant to their own territories.
The dominance of English-language content on giants such as Netflix and Amazon is diminishing; recently the first ever Spanish original series Las Chicas del Cable (Cable Girls) premiered on Netflix, whilst subtitled programming also airs from countries such as Mexico, Germany and Russia.
No longer can we (or would we want to) rely solely on English-language content.
Calls for internationalisation have also been responded to closer to home. After realising that it was vital to become more outward looking in our mindset, we now boast staff who speak Spanish, French, German, Russian, Polish, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish and Chinese.
And we don’t plan to stop there. All K7 employees are offered free language classes, with many of our employees learning new languages from scratch, or improving existing skills.
This wide language base has become an integral part of the work we do. It allows us an immediacy of research which was not possible a few years ago.
We now have access to a wealth of local-language resources which would be otherwise out of our reach, enabling us to produce a range of monthly reports which take an in-depth look at some of the most interesting territories around the globe such as Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe.
K7’s focus on multilingual services marks our move to distance ourselves from the antiquated viewpoint that “everybody speaks English” in the TV industry. Not only is this not, and should not be, the case, but it is a notion which shuts down valuable relationships.
The work we do, and our interactions with people around the globe is much more effective and valuable when we communicate on a personal level.
By expanding our language-base we are positioning ourselves to be able to give the most useful and comprehensive service to our valued international clients.
