Plan around the programme, not the hall
Traditional conference interpretation starts with the floor plan: where the booths go, how many receivers to order, who hands them out at the door. With AI interpretation on delegates’ phones, the starting point is the programme instead. Which sessions need which languages, where each room’s audio comes from, and which sessions carry enough weight to need a human interpreter.
That last question matters most. A summit is rarely one kind of session. A ministerial opening, a technical panel and a sponsor showcase have different stakes, and they can be covered in different ways under one plan.
An example from Abu Dhabi
Picture a two-day summit at an exhibition centre in Abu Dhabi, with a plenary hall and three breakout rooms. The organiser wants Arabic, English, French and Mandarin channels throughout.
- Opening ceremony and ministerial plenary: Sim Trans human interpreters in booths for Arabic and English, with SIM.AI adding French and Mandarin from the same desk feed.
- Breakouts: SIM.AI only, one session per room, with the QR printed on the room signage and the seat-drop card.
- Day two: a delegation arrives and asks for Russian. It is added to the running sessions as a setting, with no new booth and no extra receivers.
Before the event, the glossary carries every speaker’s name and title, the summit’s own initiative names and the sponsors’ product terms. For a delegation that follows proceedings in Mandarin, it is worth reading our notes on Mandarin interpretation in the Gulf when you plan the glossary.
Get the floor questions right
Q&A is where interpretation most often breaks down, at any event. Two habits make the difference. First, every question must go through a microphone that feeds the sound desk; a shouted question from row ten reaches nobody’s channel. Second, ask your moderator to repeat or summarise very long questions. Machine interpretation is at its weakest with overlapping voices and poor audio, so a clean, single voice at a time gives every delegate a better result.
What you receive afterwards
| Deliverable | What it is for |
|---|---|
| Recordings of every language channel | Archive, media team, speakers who want their session |
| Transcripts per language (.docx and .xlsx) | Summit report, press releases, outcome statements |
| Subtitle files | Session videos published after the event |
| Usage report | Languages used, session duration and listeners per language, to plan next year |
The usage report is often the most useful item for next year. It shows which languages delegates actually chose, session by session, so the next edition can be planned on evidence rather than guesswork.
Where to go next
If you are still deciding which languages to offer, read how many languages a Gulf audience needs. For the full planning timeline, from venue audio to QR placement, see our guide to planning a multilingual event in the UAE. If the plenary needs booths, our page on combining AI and human interpreters explains how one team runs both.