Technology has brought the world closer together. Consumers anywhere on the planet can log on to a company's website and purchase a product. They can stream a film created in France on a mobile device manufactured abroad from their living room in the US. A distributed team separated by thousands of miles can use a video conferencing platform to map out its strategy. A company can launch a new product virtually via a live simulcast, where audiences in different countries can watch the same content at the same time.

This unprecedented global connectedness gives your company the opportunity to reach and share its message with more people. A major challenge, though,  is communicating with people who don't speak the same language as you do. As global as business has become, it still remains local, and that means that communicating with customers in a manner they understand is critical to expanding the reach of your business and achieving core key performance indicators (KPIs).

To bridge these language gaps to connect with global audiences during live events, businesses often rely on simultaneous translation, which involves human interpreters translating what a speaker says in near real time. As more companies pivot to virtual events, including conferences, roundtables and speaker series, simultaneous translation has become even more important for reaching global audiences.

With 5G connectivity streamlining and accelerating the flow of information, companies can now deliver their message to diverse audiences even faster—no matter what language they speak.

In the modern information age, every customer interaction and business process produces an ever-growing volume of data your company must collect, analyze and redeploy to improve the customer experience and your internal operations. 5G modernizes traditional network infrastructure, allowing data and information to transfer from one source to another more quickly, with reduced latency and increased network bandwidth, availability and reliability. With these capabilities, devices and systems can function and deliver content optimally, including mobile applications, devices enabled with the Internet of Things (IoT) and technologies driven by artificial intelligence (AI).

5G can also improve business efficiency and customer communications. After all, simultaneous translation can't be effective if there's a network delay that causes a mobile device or computer to load slowly or stall altogether. It also can hinder communication for companies who rely on remote simultaneous interpretation where human interpreters perform translation services from a different location from where the event actually takes place—in some cases, thousands of miles away in another country.

Without advanced network connectivity, a conference attendee using an AI-enabled translation app to understand what a keynote speaker is saying may experience delays in the translation transmission and have a poor experience. A company launching a new product at an international conference dependent on real-time audience interactions to build excitement and momentum for its product in the marketplace may have a presentation that falls flat. A CEO discussing quarterly results during a virtual all-hands meeting with hundreds of employees across the globe may not effectively communicate their message, and an interpreter working remotely may get frustrated when the remote simultaneous interpretation solution they're using can't connect to a video conferencing platform despite repeated attempts.

In these situations, the low latency and high bandwidth 5G facilitates are critical to transmitting data—and transmitting the message. If every other word drops or a real-time feed freezes at the moment a human interpreter is translating an important point from a speaker, you run the risk of your audience missing the message entirely. Building an inclusive, high-performing company requires not only the intention to reduce language barriers, it also requires a modern technology infrastructure.