#156 VSI CEO Mark Howorth on AI in Media Localization, Adding More Dubbing Capacity

Mark Howorth, CEO of VSI, joins SlatorPod to talk about his plans for leading and scaling the media localization provider.Mark discusses his route into the media and entertainment (M&E) and language space as well as his path to joining VSI. Mark took up his role at the leading media localization provider in January 2023 after spending five years as the CEO of SDI Media including overseeing the company’s sale to Iyuno in 2021. He outlines how the media localization industry has evolved with the streaming boom impacting turnaround times. Mark also shares some of the challenges of hiring and retaining media localization talent internally and externally post-Covid. He offers his thoughts on the use of machine translation (MT) and automatic speech recognition (ASR) as productivity enhancers, rather than a replacement for human subtitling.Mark talks about VSI’s historically self-funded growth and highlights the company’s plans to scale further in 2023 and beyond. Mark shares some of the growth drivers behind VSI on the back of +20% growth in 2022. The CEO reveals key initiatives for VSI in 2023, such as building dubbing capacity, widening its customer base, and geographical expansion. The pod rounds off with Mark’s 2-3 year outlook on the media localization market in terms of customer demands.