2020 – a special year in review

2020 – a special year in review

It’s already something of an e-pixler tradition. At the end of each year, we block out a time slot in the calendars of the two managing directors, Roman Rammelt and Stefan Otto, to get a statement out of them.

The “Word of the Year” stands for the political, economic, and social life of a year. In 2020, the choice fell on “coronavirus pandemic” …

The pandemic did not pass by e-pixler NEW MEDIA GmbH either. Fortunately, no one on our team has tested positive so far. When the first wave began, we reacted very quickly and developed a comprehensive hygiene concept. Most of our employees can work very well from home. Well, and the necessary technical conditions for optimal remote work are rather second nature for us as a full-service digital agency.

So apart from the running costs for a large loft that is now not being used appropriately, the pandemic had no impact on you?

It wasn’t quite that easy. At first, customers were very cautious, service contracts were reduced, and new orders were postponed into the future. We therefore had to put some employees on short-time work temporarily. Of course, we slept more restlessly during that time and ran through cost-saving scenarios; after all, we still wanted to give all team members a future with us.

It proved worthwhile to stay calm and rethink processes. One example: just because participants are not allowed to meet each other does not mean that workshops and seminars from our e-pixler Academy have to be canceled. We quickly learned that our workshops also run successfully remotely and therefore immediately designed more on current topics.

How did things continue with customer offers and orders?

Surprisingly quickly, our developers, together with our project managers, designers, and UX experts, had plenty to do again. To our great delight, we were able to convince new customers with interesting projects of our expertise. We won several major key accounts and successfully completed various online projects.

You also somehow managed to get through a merger “on the side.”

That’s right, e-pixler NEW MEDIA GmbH and e-pixler HOSTING GmbH have merged. The entire range of services is now located within NEW MEDIA. The merger brought fresh momentum to our workflows. We invested in a completely new, highly modern infrastructure, recruited additional specialists, and optimized important processes. We are optimistic that we have thereby created a win-win situation for our customers and for ourselves.

That sounds like growth and continuity ...

We couldn’t have put it better ourselves. In fact, over the past few months we have hired new developers, project managers, and UX designers. We have major projects in the pipeline. When things get going, we’ll be ready.

... and not just in terms of staffing. Since recently, e-pixler NEW MEDIA GmbH has been an authorized go-digital consultant. What is that about?

As a professional full-service digital agency, we don’t just want to talk about digital transformation. We want to actively drive it forward. In the past, we have repeatedly hit limits. Because digitalization costs money. The budgets of our clients from small and medium-sized businesses are often only enough for a solution that falls short of real needs. So we acted. With this certification, we have taken an important step forward. We can activate funding and thus support our customers as a pathfinder for sophisticated digital solutions.

What has the response been like?

Shortly after we sent out our information newsletter, the first inquiry came in. The response has been huge – we really hit a nerve with many people. Both new and existing customers. Anyone who wants to learn more about funding opportunities can find information on our website under News.

You already mentioned that the e-pixler Academy took new paths under coronavirus conditions. Perhaps one more highlight?

Spontaneously, we think of the online seminar with eleven representatives from HTW Berlin on the topic of accessibility / barrier-free access on the web. Our accessibility expert Dr. Rebecca Walter and our developer Michael Kasten looked at their website together with the HTW team and discussed all the barriers related to accessibility in detail. On the same topic, there were also well-attended online meetups. Participants wanted to know what website operators need to pay attention to under the new law, how they can avoid pitfalls, and what advantages an accessible website offers them.

Among the highlights, we would also place our self-developed Consent Management Tool. It guarantees the highest reliability thanks to our innovative approach of removing cookies/scripts from the HTML code beforehand and loading only what has actually been approved by the user.

Those were some selective successes from this year. What happens next, what will be in focus in 2021?

Next year we will increasingly “let loose” with innovative technologies. Our main focus is on computer vision, artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain technology, but also virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and, not to forget, big data. We have already started with an initial blockchain project and a forward-looking eye-tracking project on mobile devices.

As keywords for a brief outlook, we can leave it at that. Once the projects produce concrete results, we would be happy to learn more.

Promise!

Interview: rera