托福雙語閱讀素材：中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)巨頭燃起戰(zhàn)火

想要提高托福閱讀能力，我們一定要在日常生活中有意識地增加英語閱讀量，提升語感和熟練度，這其中比較常用也比較方便地一個方式就是利用各類英文報刊雜志文章進行精讀與泛讀練習。下面我們來看一篇經(jīng)濟學人文章：中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)巨頭燃起戰(zhàn)火。

China’s internet giants

Three kingdoms, two empires

China’s internet giants battle at home and abroad

中國的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)巨頭

三國鼎立，兩帝稱雄

中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)巨頭在國內外燃起戰(zhàn)火

THERE was a time, not that long ago, when China’s big internet companies were dismissed by investors in Silicon Valley as marginal firms with a tendency to copy Western products. Not any more. Today they are monsters with increasingly hefty international ambitions.

就在不久前，硅谷的投資者還根本不把中國的大型互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司放在眼里，認為它們不過是些邊緣企業(yè)，往往都是照搬西方的產(chǎn)品。時過境遷，今天這些中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司已經(jīng)長成了猛獸，在國際市場上的野心不斷膨脹。

Alibaba, China’s biggest e-commerce group, handles more transactions each year than do eBay and Amazon combined. Jack Ma, its chairman, pledges to serve 2bn consumers around the world within 20 years. Tencent, which specialises in online games and social media, is now the world’s tenth most valuable public firm, worth some $275bn. Pony Ma (no relation), its chairman, wants China to “preside over the global tech revolution of the future”. But as the two firms become global forces, the third member of China’s “BAT” trio of internet giants, Baidu, an online-search firm that came to dominate the mainland market after Google left the country to avoid censorship, is lagging behind.

中國最大的電商集團阿里巴巴每年處理的交易量超過eBay和亞馬遜的總和，董事局主席馬云承諾要在20年內為全球20億消費者提供服務。專注網(wǎng)絡游戲和社交媒體的騰訊公司現(xiàn)在是世界第十大最有價值的上市公司，市值約2750億美元。董事長馬化騰(和馬云不是親戚)希望中國能“領導未來的全球科技革命”。中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)三巨頭“BAT”中的第三位是百度。谷歌為避免審查制度退出中國后，百度便稱霸中國大陸的在線搜索市場。另外兩大巨頭已成為國際大公司，百度卻落在人后。

All three firms differ from their Western peers in important ways. First, Western companies usually prefer to focus on a few core areas, whereas Chinese internet firms typically try to do everything from cloud computing to digital payments. When this works, as with Tencent’s wildly successful app, WeChat, the results can be impressive.

這三家公司與西方同行在幾個重要方面有所不同。首先，西方公司通常會聚焦幾個核心領域，而中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司一般涉獵廣泛，從云計算到數(shù)字支付無不嘗試。這樣的嘗試一旦成功，結果便會非?？捎^，騰訊大獲成功的應用微信即是如此。

Second, with the exception of political censorship, the internet sector in China is lightly regulated. Facebook, Apple and Google, in contrast, face increasing scrutiny. Chinese internet firms can achieve market domination of a sort that would attract close attention in other markets.

第二，拋開要接受政治審查這一點，中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)行業(yè)的監(jiān)管較為寬松;而Facebook、蘋果和谷歌則面臨日益嚴格的審視。以中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)企業(yè)能達到的市場支配地位，換在其他市場，會受到監(jiān)管機構的密切關注。

The third difference is that they can succeed on a rapid and massive scale because the state-dominated economy is so inefficient. Often there is not even a physical infrastructure to leapfrog—so-called third-tier cities, for example, often lack big retail centres. Nationwide there is one shopping mall per 1.2m people.

第三個區(qū)別是，由于國家主導的經(jīng)濟效率低下，中國互聯(lián)網(wǎng)企業(yè)可以快速取得大規(guī)模成功。企業(yè)發(fā)展過程中通常甚至都沒有擋路的實體機構，比如在所謂的三線城市，往往都缺少大型零售中心。中國每120萬人才有一個大型購物中心。

A huge home market has not stopped the trio from fighting bloody turf wars among each other. The outcome to this battle is rapidly becoming clear. Tencent and Alibaba are surging ahead; a series of own goals has left Baidu far behind. The common jibe about Baidu among local experts is that it is becoming the Yahoo of China, a once-dominant search giant that sank owing to a lack of innovation and a series of management blunders.

國內市場如此巨大，卻仍未能阻止這三巨頭相互廝殺搶奪地盤。這場戰(zhàn)斗的結果正迅速明朗。騰訊和阿里巴巴遙遙領先，百度則因自己一連串的烏龍球而遠遠落后。國內專家最常用來挖苦百度的一個說法就是它正在變成中國的雅虎。雅虎一度是占據(jù)市場主導地位的搜索巨頭，卻因缺乏創(chuàng)新和一系列管理失誤而沉淪。

Its revenue growth fell to 6.3% in 2016, down from 35% in 2015 and 54% in 2014. The firm gets some nine-tenths of its revenues from online ads, but this income is plunging as marketers redirect spending from search ads on Baidu to social-media networks like WeChat and mobile-commerce platforms run by Alibaba. Meanwhile, Baidu is burning cash trying to keep its various big bets on artificial intelligence (AI), online video, virtual and augmented-reality technologies, and “online to offline” (O2O) services going. One of China’s most respected business consultants is pessimistic about its future: “There is very little chance they’ll be relevant in five years.”

百度的收入增長率在2016年下降至6.3%，遠低于2015年的35%和2014年的54%。公司收入約九成都來自在線廣告，但由于商家把花在百度搜索廣告的錢轉投至微信這樣的社交媒體網(wǎng)絡以及阿里巴巴運營的移動商務平臺，百度的收入大幅下滑。同時，百度還在燒錢維系它的幾個大賭注：人工智能(AI)、在線視頻、虛擬和增強現(xiàn)實技術，以及“線上到線下”(O2O)服務。中國最受尊敬的商業(yè)顧問之一對百度的未來持悲觀態(tài)度：“五年以后很可能就沒百度什么事了。”

Of the other two giants, Tencent is probably the most fearsome. It already has higher revenues and profits than Alibaba (see chart). Its value is set to climb as it ramps up advertising on WeChat (provided that does not provoke a backlash from users). Its main weapon against Alibaba is its stake in JD.com, the country’s second-biggest e-commerce firm, led by Richard Liu, one of China’s most aggressive and successful serial entrepreneurs.

至于其他兩個巨頭，騰訊可能最令人生畏，其收入和利潤都已超過阿里巴巴(見圖表)。隨著騰訊不斷增加微信上的廣告投放(只要不引起用戶的反對)，其價值勢必節(jié)節(jié)攀升。騰訊對付阿里巴巴的主要武器是其在京東的股份。京東是中國第二大電子商務公司，領導人劉強東是中國最富進取心也是最成功的連續(xù)創(chuàng)業(yè)家之一。

https://JD.com has adopted an expensive “asset-heavy” business model akin to Amazon’s in America. Thus far, its vast investments in warehouses, logistics and couriers have not come anywhere near toppling Alibaba. But last year the company saw its revenues rise to $37.5bn, up from $28bn the previous year. Its share of China’s business-to-consumer market rose to 25% in 2016, up from 18% at the end of 2014. If Mr Liu’s investments in infrastructure start to pay off, much of Alibaba’s future domestic growth could be at risk.

京東采取了成本很高的“重資產(chǎn)”商業(yè)模式，與美國的亞馬遜類似。到目前為止，京東在倉儲、物流和快遞方面的龐大投資還遠不足以掀翻阿里巴巴。但在去年，京東的收入已從前年的280億美元升至375億美元。它在中國B2C市場的份額在2014年底為18%，2016年攀升至25%。如果劉強東對基礎設施的投資開始收效，阿里巴巴未來國內增長的大頭可能面臨風險。

That threat may explain why Mr Ma is not content with Alibaba’s overall 70% share of the local e-commerce market. In 2016 it spent $1bn to win control of Lazada, South-East Asia’s biggest e-commerce firm. In March Lazada launched a new service for Singaporeans directly to shop on Taobao, one of Alibaba’s two domestic e-commerce platforms (the other is Tmall).

上述威脅也許可以解釋為何阿里巴巴在國內電子商務市場的份額雖已高達70%，但馬云并不滿足。2016年，阿里巴巴斥資10億美元控股東南亞最大的電子商務公司Lazada。3月，Lazada推出了方便新加坡人直接上淘寶購物的新服務(淘寶是阿里巴巴兩個國內電子商務平臺之一，另一個是天貓)。

Mr Ma last year persuaded the G20 summit of leading countries to endorse his proposal for an “electronic world trade platform” (eWTP), to make it easier for small businesses to trade across borders. In March Alibaba launched a “digital free-trade zone” as part of the initiative, in Malaysia. This public-private partnership, which involves simplifying both logistics and payments, will help small merchants.

去年，為了便于小企業(yè)開展跨境貿易，馬云說服二十國集團首腦會議接受了他提出的“電子世界貿易平臺”(eWTP)。3月，阿里巴巴在馬來西亞推出了eWTP的一個項目“數(shù)字自由貿易區(qū)”，通過公私合作來簡化物流和支付，為小商戶助力。

Mr Ma’s chief weapon for going global, however, is Ant Financial, which was spun out of Alibaba before the latter’s $25bn flotation in 2014 in New York. In China the unit offers services ranging from online banking to investment products; it even runs the mainland’s first proper consumer credit-scoring agency, Sesame Credit, which uses big data to work out the creditworthiness of punters. Ant already has more than 450m customers in China and is going overseas with gusto.

然而，馬云邁向世界的主要武器是螞蟻金服。2014年阿里巴巴在紐約上市，融資250億美元，螞蟻金服就是在這之前從集團剝離的。在中國，螞蟻金服提供從網(wǎng)上銀行到投資產(chǎn)品等各種服務。它甚至還管理著中國大陸第一個嚴格意義上的消費者信用評分機構——芝麻信用，利用大數(shù)據(jù)來確定客戶的信用狀況。螞蟻金服在中國已擁有超過4.5億客戶，且正熱情高漲地走向海外市場。

It has investments in local online-payments firms in Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore and South Korea. In America Ant is in a frenzied bidding and lobbying war with Euronet, an American rival, to buy MoneyGram International, a money-transfer firm. On April 17th Ant raised its initial offer for MoneyGram by over a third to $1.2bn, topping Euronet’s bid.

螞蟻金服投資了泰國、菲律賓、新加坡和韓國的在線支付公司。在美國，為收購匯款服務供應商速匯金(MoneyGram International)，螞蟻正與美國競爭對手Euronet展開一場瘋狂的收購和游說戰(zhàn)。 4月17日，螞蟻把對速匯金的首次報價提高了超過三分之一，達12億美元，高出了Euronet的報價。

Tencent is also making bold acquisitions abroad. A consortium that it led spent $8.6bn to acquire Finland’s Supercell last year, a deal that turned Tencent into the world’s biggest purveyor of online games. Together with Taiwan’s Foxconn, a contract-manufacturing giant, the firm invested $175m last year into Hike Messenger, an Indian messaging app akin to America’s WhatsApp. It was also an early investor in America’s Snapchat, another popular messaging app, whose parent company Snap went public in March.

騰訊也在國外展開大膽收購。去年，騰訊領銜的財團斥資86億美元收購了芬蘭的Supercell，令騰訊成為世界最大的在線游戲公司。去年騰訊還聯(lián)合臺灣代工巨頭富士康共同對印度的即時消息應用Hike Messenger(類似美國的WhatsApp)投資1.75億美元。騰訊也是另一個流行的即時消息應用——美國的Snapchat——的早期投資者，Snapchat的母公司Snap于3月上市。

One reason for these purchases is that Tencent’s earlier efforts to promote WeChat abroad (including a splashy advertising campaign in Europe featuring Lionel Messi, a footballer) flopped. Established social networks such as Facebook and WhatsApp proved too entrenched to dislodge. They also did some copying of their own: once they adopted some of WeChat’s innovations, Western consumers had little reason to switch to the Chinese network.

這一系列投資動作有一個原因：騰訊早些時候在國外推廣微信的努力告敗(包括花大價錢在歐洲進行的一次廣告宣傳活動，當時還請了足球運動員梅西代言)。事實證明Facebook和WhatsApp這樣成熟的社交網(wǎng)絡的地位已牢不可破。而且那些社交網(wǎng)絡自己也照搬了微信的一些做法，而它們一旦采用了微信的創(chuàng)新，西方消費者就更沒什么理由改用中國的社交網(wǎng)絡了。

Such investments have been in Tencent’s core areas, away from turf occupied by Alibaba and Baidu. Sometimes, the trio end up co-operating, if not by design. All three BAT firms are backers of Didi Chuxing, a ride-hailing firm with global pretensions of its own. But in other ways their domestic war is spilling into foreign markets.

騰訊的這些投資一直是在其核心領域，遠離阿里巴巴和百度的地盤。有時候，雖然不是有意為之，三巨頭倒也成為了合作者。BAT都投資了本身也有意打入國際市場的網(wǎng)約車公司滴滴出行。但在其他方面，三巨頭在國內的戰(zhàn)火正在向國外市場蔓延。

India is one such battleground. In April, together with eBay and Microsoft, Tencent invested $1.4bn into Flipkart, a leading Indian online retailer. Alibaba and Ant together are reported to have invested nearly $900m in Paytm, India’s top online-payments firm; in February, Paytm launched an e-commerce portal akin to Alibaba’s Tmall to take on Flipkart and Amazon in India.

印度便是它們在海外的一個戰(zhàn)場。4月，騰訊與eBay和微軟合作，向印度領先的網(wǎng)絡零售商Flipkart投資14億美元。據(jù)報道，阿里巴巴和螞蟻金服已對印度最大的在線支付公司Paytm投資近9億美元。2月，Paytm在印度推出了一個類似阿里巴巴天貓的電商門戶，與Flipkart和亞馬遜印度抗衡。

Elsewhere, Tencent unveiled a service in March that will allow firms in Europe to use WeChat to sell on the mainland. This will let them sell directly into China, avoiding red tape. Tencent also recently invested $1.8bn in America’s Tesla, a pioneer in electric and autonomous vehicles. That is a particular challenge to Baidu, which is betting its future on machine learning and AI.

在其他方面，騰訊于3月推出了一項服務，將允許歐洲的公司通過微信在大陸展開銷售。這樣這些公司便可直接進入中國，省去了繁瑣的審批程序。騰訊最近還向電動及自動駕駛汽車先行者美國特斯拉投資18億美元。這對把自身未來賭在機器學習和AI上的百度來說尤其是個挑戰(zhàn)。

Baidu’s push abroad is mainly a way to get access to talent in these fields. The firm has just started its first recruiting campaign at top American universities, including Stanford University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It has a respected AI laboratory in Silicon Valley, despite the recent departure of Andrew Ng, an AI expert. But Baidu does not have the same firepower as Alibaba and Tencent. It tried but has failed to conquer foreign markets such as Japan with its search engine. In April it opened up its self-driving technology to rivals, as Tesla did in 2014, but it has a long way to go before it makes an impact in autonomous driving.

百度推進海外市場主要是為了獲得這些領域的人才。最近，百度啟動了在斯坦福大學和麻省理工學院等美國頂尖大學的首次招聘活動。百度在硅谷有一間頗有聲望的AI實驗室，盡管AI專家吳恩達最近已離職。不過百度并沒有阿里巴巴和騰訊那樣雄厚的資金實力。它的搜索引擎曾嘗試征服日本等國外市場，但未能得手。4月，百度向對手開放了自己的無人駕駛技術，和特斯拉在2014年的做法一樣。但要在這一領域產(chǎn)生影響力，百度還有很長的路要走。

Grandiose BAT statements about global aims should be taken with a pinch of salt. It would be an error to neglect the profitable domestic market. Goldman Sachs, an investment bank, reckons that China’s online retail market will more than double in size by 2020, to $1.7trn. As Duncan Clark, author of a recent book on Alibaba, points out, whatever headlines Mr Ma and other internet bosses make with their overseas ventures, “it takes a lot to get away from the sheer gravity of China.” But at home and abroad, one thing is clear: China’s internet titans cannot be ignored.

BAT有關全球目標的豪言壯語不能全信。忽視有利可圖的國內市場無異于犯錯。投資銀行高盛認為，到2020年，中國的在線零售市場規(guī)模將至少翻一番，達到1.7萬億美元。正如鄧肯·克拉克(Duncan Clark)最近在他關于阿里巴巴的書中指出的那樣，不管馬云和其他互聯(lián)網(wǎng)大佬在海外拓展過程中做出了什么引人矚目的舉動，“要脫離中國市場的強大引力可沒那么容易。”但不論是在國內還是國外，有一點很明確：中國的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)巨頭不容忽視。