CSOFT Annual Summit – The Impact of the Sharing Economy

From September 22^nd to the 24^th, the CSOFT 12th annual summit, themed “Thriving in a Global Economy: It’s A Small World After All”, was held in the Shangri-La Hotel in Shanghai, China. This year’s Summit gathered CSOFT executives, chief linguists, industry experts, academics, government officials, and associated media from 30 countries for an insightful discourse on how innovation is shaping the global economy, with a particular focus on translation and localization.

One of the themes on everyone’s minds after this year’s summit was the impact of the sharing economy in China. Shunee Yee, the Founder and CEO of CSOFT sat down with Marisa Drew, the Co-Head EMEA Investment Banking and Capital Markets of Credit Suisse and Michael Kuan, the Chairman of Kuan Capital. Together they discussed how megatrends impact the sharing economy and how global interaction has changed tremendously because of our political and economic situation. Together the three expanded on what it means to look more deeply into the opportunities and challenges that arise from living in this connected world.

Drew talked about the general trends of the global economy. She believes that the three trends of future global development are the sharing economy, artificial intelligence, and the application of big data. In addition to the current travel and accommodation fields that the sharing economy has already penetrated, other fields such as online education ans health care will also benefit greatly from the sharing economy. Drew explained that the sharing economy means that in remote areas of the world people can use the Internet to take courses from the word’s top schools, research medical data, and understand worldwide case studies which can help to prevent disease.

In the sharing economy, people not only receive common benefits but they also face common challenges. Is innovation the answer to challenges? “Innovation is the only solution. Innovation and technology are necessary to change our lives,” said Kuan, an innovative investor.

Speaking of the future investment fields, Kuan said that “we should pay attention to the general trends and concern about long-term investment. In order to get good return, we must have a long-term vision, for example, the medical fields can help solve the population aging problem. I think we should invest in the language industry, because the language industry is the engine of the sharing economy. Through it, we can deliver the culture and influence behind brands and products, and this is the power of the sharing economy.”

As for the common challenges facing the whole world, Kuan called on all sectors of society to join forces to study ways to solve social problems and make our world a better place. At CSOFT, we make every effort to take advantage of the changing trends in society to provide quality localization services whatever the development. With investment in companies like Stepes, we plan to make translation services more accessible and innovative with a strong focus on user accessibility.