《Economist》：China loses its allure

ACCORDING to the late Roberto Goizueta, a former boss of The Coca-Cola Company, April 15th 1981 was “one of the most important days…in the history of the world.” That date marked the opening of the first Coke bottling plant to be built in China since the Communist revolution.

The claim was over the top, but not absurd. Mao Zedong’s disastrous policies had left the economy in tatters. The height of popular aspiration was the “four things that go round”: bicycles, sewing machines, fans and watches. The welcome that Deng Xiaoping, China’s then leader, gave to foreign firms was part of a series of changes that turned China into one of the biggest and fastest-growing markets in the world.


In this section

China loses its allure


Reinventing the wheel


Worse than useless


Desperate times


The recovery



Reprints

Related topics

China



For the past three decades, multinationals have poured in. After the financial crisis, many companies looked to China for salvation. Now it looks as though the gold rush may be over.

More pain, less gain

In some ways, China’s market is still the world’s most enticing. Although it accounts for only around 8% of private consumption in the world, it contributed more than any other country to the growth of consumption in 2011-13. Firms like GM and Apple have made fat profits there.

But for many foreign companies, things are getting harder. That is partly because growth is flagging (see article), while costs are rising. Talented young workers are getting harder to find, and pay is soaring.

China’s government has always made life difficult for firms in some sectors—it has restricted market access for foreign banks and brokerage houses and blocked internet firms, including Facebook and Twitter—but the tough treatment seems to be spreading. Hardware firms such as Cisco, IBM and Qualcomm are facing a post-Snowden backlash; GlaxoSmithKline, a drugmaker, is ensnared in a corruption probe; Apple was forced into a humiliating apology last year for offering inadequate warranties; and Starbucks has been accused by state media of price-gouging. A sweeping consumer-protection law will come into force in March, possibly providing a fresh line of attack on multinationals. And the government’s crackdown on extravagant spending by officials is hitting the foreign firms that peddle luxuries (see article).

Competition is heating up. China was already the world’s fiercest battleground for global brands but local firms, long laggards in quality, are joining the fray. Many now have overseas experience, and some are developing inventive products. Xiaomi and Huawei have come up with world-class smartphones, and Sany’s excellent diggers are taking on costlier ones made by Hitachi and Caterpillar. Consumers will no longer pay a hefty premium just because a brand is foreign. Their internet savvy and lack of brand loyalty makes them the world’s most demanding customers (see article).

Some companies are leaving. Revlon said in December that it was pulling out altogether. L’Oréal, the world’s largest cosmetics firm, said soon afterwards that it would stop selling one of its main brands, Garnier. Best Buy, an American electronics retailer, and Media Markt, a German rival, have already left, as has Yahoo, an internet giant. Tesco, a British food retailer, last year gave up trying to go it alone, and entered a joint venture with a state-owned firm.

Some of those who are staying are struggling. IBM this week said that revenues in China fell by 23% during the last quarter of 2013. Rémy Cointreau, a French drinks group, reported that sales of its Rémy Martin cognac fell by more than 30% during the first three quarters of last year because of a plunge in China. Yum Brands, an American fast-food firm, said in September last year that same-store sales in China had fallen by 16% in the year to date. Its problems were partly the result of a government investigation into alleged illegal antibiotic use by its chicken suppliers.

Investors no longer celebrate firms with big investments in China. Our Sinodependency Index weights American multinationals by their China revenues. Sino-dependent firms used to outperform their peers, but in the past two years their share prices have done worse than others’.

As Jeffrey Immelt, the boss of GE, puts it, “China is big, but it is hard…[other] places are equally big, but they are not quite as hard.” Companies that want to stay in China will have to put in even more effort. Many will have to change strategy.

One China is over

First, rising costs mean that bosses must shift from going for growth to enhancing productivity. This sounds obvious, but in China the mentality has long been “just throw more men at the problem”. One way to get a grip on costs is to invest in labour-substituting technology, not only in manufacturing but also in services. Also, multinationals are falling behind local firms like Alibaba and Tencent in exploiting a surge of big data coming from e-commerce and smartphones.

Second, tighter control is another must. GSK’s bosses in London admitted that its problems in China were partly the result of executives acting “outside of our processes and control”. Managers in headquarters must ensure that executives’ behaviour and safety standards are as high as anywhere else in the world. Chinese consumers are even more active on social media than those in the West, so any scandal is instantly broadcast nationally.






Our interactive Sinodependency index gauges China's influence on the fortunes of American multinationals


Lastly, a One China policy no longer makes sense. Most firms set up their local offices when China’s economy was smaller than $2 trillion. Although it will soon be five times that size, many still try to run their operations from Shanghai. That makes little sense when tastes in food, fashion and much else vary between provinces and mega-cities that have populations as big as European countries. Some 400m Chinese do not speak Mandarin. So even as CEOs need to keep a closer eye on standards and behaviour, they should localise marketing and perhaps product development.

China is still a rich prize. Firms that can boost productivity, improve governance and respond to local tastes can still prosper. But the golden years are over.

《经济学人》跨国企业：中国的诱惑力正在褪去

用可口可乐公司前董事长罗伯特·戈伊苏埃塔(Roberto Goizueta)的话来说，1981年4月15日是“世界历史上最重要的日子之一”。这一天标志着文革后中国第一家可乐灌装工厂的成立。

    这么说有些言过其实，但并不荒唐。文革期间毛的灾难性政策使整个经济支离破碎。那时人们最渴望的东西无非是“四大转”：自行车、缝纫机、电风扇和手表。时任领导人邓小平对外国企业的开放是当时中国开始向世界最大、发展最快的市场迈进这一转变中的一部分。

     在过去的三十年间，跨国企业相继涌进中国市场。经济危机之后，很多公司把中国当做了救命稻草。而现在，这股淘金热似乎正在走向终结。

      事倍功半

       某种程度上说，中国仍然是世界上最具诱惑力的市场。尽管只占有全球约8%的私人消费，中国市场对于2011-13年间消费增长的贡献却高于任何其他国家。通用、苹果等公司已经在这里赚得盆满钵满。

     但是对更多的外企来说，这里的一切都变得更加艰难。这部分是因为增长正在衰退，而成本却在上升。有才能的年轻工人越来越难雇到，薪水也在飙升。

     中国政府也一向在为某些行业的公司制造阻碍——限制外资银行、证券公司进入大陆市场，封杀包括Facebook和Twitter在内的互联网公司——但现在，这些苛刻的待遇似乎正向其它行业蔓延。思科、IBM、高通等一些硬件公司正在面临“后斯诺登时代”的抵制。制药商葛兰素史克被卷入一起腐败案的调查；苹果去年被迫就不平等的保修政策作出了使之蒙羞的道歉；星巴克因价格歧视问题被国有媒体指责。一部全面的消费者权益保护法即将在三月份施行，并有可能就此促成一股新的针对跨国企业的攻击。此外，政府对官员铺张浪费行为的打击也冲击了奢侈品行业的公司。

     竞争正在加剧。中国已经是全球品牌最激烈的战场，但与此同时，本土企业，在质量上严重的落后者，也在加入这场战斗。他们中的很多已经有了海外市场经验，另一些正在研发创新型产品。小米和华为已经有了世界一流的智能手机，三一重工性能杰出的挖掘机也正逐渐取代日立和卡特彼勒的昂贵产品。中国消费者不会再仅仅为了一个外国品牌而增加大笔额外支出。他们对互联网的了解和对品牌忠诚度的缺乏已然使他们成为世界上最难伺候的一群消费者。

     一些企业正在撤离。露华浓在去年12月透露公司正在全线撤出中国市场。全球最大的化妆品公司欧莱雅也在那之后宣布公司将停止在华销售旗下主要品牌——卡尼尔。美国电器零售商百思买，以及德国的同业者万得城，都已经撤出中国市场，步了互联网巨擘雅虎的后尘。英国食品零售商乐购去年也放弃了独自征战，转而与一家国有企业合资经营。

     一些留下的公司正在挣扎。本周，IBM公布其2013年第四季度在中国的收益下降了23%。法国酒类制造商人头马君度宣布，由于中国市场的下滑，去年前三季度的人头马干邑销售额下降了30%以上。美国餐饮集团百胜在去年9月份也谈到了类似情况——至当年9月止，中国店铺的销售额下滑了16%。该公司的问题部分是因为政府对宣称的其鸡肉供应商里所含非法抗生素的调查。



     投资者不再为公司在华的大额投资而庆祝。我们所公布的“对中国依赖指数” (Sinodependency index) 通过在华收益去衡量美国的跨国公司们。以前，依赖中国的公司通常会跑赢对手，然而在过去的两年间，他们在股价上的表现已经落后于对手。

     正如通用公司董事长兼CEO杰夫·伊梅尔特(Jeffrey Immelt)所言，“中国很大，但也很难对付……（其它）地方一样大，但并没那么艰难。” 有意留在中国的公司将必须投入更多努力。很多公司也将面临战略调整。

     不再是“一个中国”

     首先，成本的上涨意味着老板们必须从追求增长转向提高生产率。这听起来是很明显的事，但是在中国，思路总是长久地停留在“多投入人力就可以解决问题”这一套路。控制成本的方法之一就是对人力替代型技术的投入，不仅在生产环节，服务环节也一样。另外，在迎战随着电子商务和智能手机而来的大数据浪潮方面，跨国企业已经落后于譬如阿里巴巴和腾讯这类本土企业。

     其次，更严格的管理。葛兰素史克在伦敦的老板们已经承认，他们在华的问题部分是由执行者们不断上演“超出我们的流程和控制”的戏码而导致的。总部的管理者们必须保证执行者的行为和安全标准与全球任何其它地方都处在同一高度。中国的消费者们在社交媒体上的表现比西方人更为活跃，所以任何丑闻都会在眨眼间传遍全国。

     最后，“一个中国”的政策已经不再适用。大多数公司在中国经济总量还不到2万亿的时候就设立了在华办事处。尽管这一数值很快将达到其5倍之多，很多公司仍然希望留在上海继续他们的经营。然而中国各省份和大城市都拥有相当于一个欧洲国家的人口，它们在食物口味、流行时尚以及很多方面都千差万别，停留一隅几乎没有意义。中国有大约4亿人不说普通话。所以即使当CEO们密切关注标准和行为的时候，他们也应当做好营销的本土化，或者更进一步，产品研发。

     中国依然是一份丰厚的大奖。那些能够提高生产率、加强管理并懂得回应本土市场需求的公司仍将继续他们的成功之路。然而黄金年代已然逝去。

哪位仁兄给大致翻译下？

youlong1008 发表于 2014-2-11 21:38
哪位仁兄给大致翻译下？

译言网友此篇报道的网友翻译，因为这个论坛有词过滤设置，无法转过来，自己去那边看吧。

谢谢楼主分享！！！！

路过，顺便看看，学习一下

<Economist>, which I believe, is almost the best magazine for English study after graduation from college. Its language is more native and fresh than China Daily, Crazy English and other stuffs.

大浪淘沙，后面怎么说来的？有些公司以往就对中国市场执行另外一套标准，现在是该他们反思的是时候了

看这玩意好头疼，从上学时候都推荐，可是还是不喜欢

学习了学习了！！！