Why did we call our company Macte Animo and what does it mean? “Macte animo” are the first two words of a line in a Latin epic poem that my father often cited to give me courage. Here is the complete sentence, its source and meaning from Wikipedia:
“Macte animo, generose puer! Sic itur ad astra.” “Courage noble child! This is how we rise to the stars”. Virgil, the Æneid, 9, 641. Prophetic words spoken by Apollo to the young Ascanius, son of Æneas and grandson of Priam.
Macte Animo is managed by Andrew Webster and Anne-Françoise Webster (She goes by Anne Webster in English).
Andrew has a diverse academic background and three Masters degrees. He has more than 20 years of experience in localisation, much of it whilst working in the USA in San Jose CA and Seattle WA. Before co-founding Macte Animo, he worked both in Europe and the USA for companies such as Aldus, Adobe Systems and RealNetworks prior to then becoming a localisation consultant. Both as a Director and General Manager of International Software Development, Andrew has managed large teams of developers, program managers, product managers and QA both on-site and remotely (in Western Europe and countries like China, and Russia. Products included Aldus PageMaker, Adobe Photoshop, Acrobat and Illustrator, RealPlayer and a suite of online entertainment and ecommerce services.
Andrew is very detail-oriented which makes him well-suited to what he does. Andrew is passionate about computing, history, music, reading, photography and home cinema: he cannot bear to be without his computers, cameras, films, music and books! One caveat: never call Andrew English, he is very much Scottish!
You will find his CV on LinkedIn here.
Anne-Françoise went to the USA for a year to take an MBA and ended up staying for 25 years! She too has an eclectic academic background with a Master of Law degree from France and an MBA in International Business from Chicago. From contract negotiation and purchasing management to the recruitment and remote management of international and intercultural teams, nothing escapes her!
Anne (just Anne in English) has worked with major American companies such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google to name but a few.
Anne has been fully certified as a corporate trainer since January 2019 thereby allowing her to share her knowledge and experience in international management.
Her passion? To travel and interact with different cultures.
You will find her CV on LinkedIn here