小米瞄準非洲市場 進一步國際化
BEIJING — In 2013, the Chinese smartphone company Xiaomi hired Hugo Barra, a Brazilian-born, M.I.T.-trained former senior executive of Google.
北京——2013年，中國的智能手機公司小米聘用了在巴西出生，畢業於美國麻省理工學院的Google前任資深總裁雨果·巴拉(Hugo Barra)。
Mr. Barra’s appointment as vice president for international operations was considered a coup for the fast-growing company, which was founded in 2010. As the favorite of young Chinese buyers proud to acquire a home-designed product, Xiaomi rocketed to the No. 1 position in the domestic market in 2014 and was the world’s third-largest phone maker.
巴拉以國際業務副總裁的身份加入小米，被視作這家成立於2010年，正經歷快速增長的公司一個巧妙舉措。隨着中國的年輕消費者越來越熱衷於購買本土設計的產品，小米已於2014年成躍升爲中國本土市場第一品牌，同時也成爲全球第三大手機制造商。
Xiaomi’s market position looked a little less rosy in the third quarter of this year. The research firm Canalys said the company had lost its top spot in China to Huawei, another Chinese company.
今年第三季度，小米的市場地位看起來並不樂觀。市場調研公司易觀國際(Canalys)稱，小米中國第一的地位已被另一家中國公司華爲搶佔。
The company has expanded its product line, developing home products like an air purifier, a webcam and blood pressure monitor. Last month, Xiaomi showcased a range of new products at a Beijing event, including the Redmi Note 3 smartphone, the Mi Pad 2, and the Mi Air Purifier 2. The event was packed with the company’s fans, all eager to listen to the sales pitch of Xiaomi’s founder, Lei Jun, who spoke from a stage much in the style of Steve Jobs and Timothy Cook of Apple.
小米公司已經開始擴展其產品線，正在開發空氣淨化器、網絡攝像頭，以及血壓計等家居產品。就在上個月，小米在北京的發佈會上展示了一系列新產品，包括紅米Note3智能手機、小米平板2，以及小米空氣淨化器2。該公司的粉絲踊躍參加了這次發佈會，大家都期待聽到小米創始人，雷軍的產品推介。雷軍會在臺上講話，其風格近似蘋果公司的史蒂夫·喬布斯(Steve Jobs)和蒂莫西·庫克(Timothy Cook)。
Mr. Barra, along with other senior executives, were also in attendance. After the event, he talked about the company’s international strategy, and answered questions about the demands of the China market:
巴拉與其他資深高管也一同出席了此次發佈會。會後，他談了小米公司的國際戰略，並回答了與中國市場的需求有關的問題：
Q. You are in charge of Xiaomi’s sales outside China. How are sales for smartphones doing in India, and in Brazil? Who is the competition in those two markets? What country is your next overseas target?
問：您負責小米的海外銷售工作，小米的智能手機在印度和巴西銷售情況如何？這兩個市場的競爭對手都是誰？您在海外市場的下一個目標又是哪裏？
A. India has been a terrific journey for Xiaomi and one that I’ve had the opportunity to be part of and help drive from the very beginning. In fact, I’ve spent at least 50 percent of my own time over the last 18 months on that market alone, and it’s been a worthwhile investment. From a standing start in July 2014, we sold three million devices in about one year, and in Q3 we sold more than one million devices, the first time we’ve done that in one single quarter in India — in 2015 so far, we’ve averaged 45 percent growth quarter over quarter. We have also been investing significantly in India: We launched our own e-commerce website in Q2, and in Q3 we started our local manufacturing operation and opened a large office in Bangalore.
答：小米在印度取得了不錯的成績，印度市場是我本人親身參與並從頭開始一手推動的。實際上，過去18個月來，僅在印度市場上，我本人就投入了至少50%的時間，事實證明這樣的投入非常值得。從2014年7月至今，我們在大約一年的時間裏售出了三百萬部設備，僅第三季度就售出超過一百萬部設備，這是我們首次在印度用一個季度取得了這樣的佳績——2015年到目前爲止，我們的季度環比增長率平均45%。同時我們還在印度進行了大量投入：我們於二季度發佈了自己的電商網站，在三季度開始本地生產的運作，並在班加羅爾開設了一個大型的辦公室。
Indonesia and Brazil are the other two large markets we’ve been investing in. We’ve launched our own e-commerce operation in both markets and are quickly growing our teams, plus we also set up our own manufacturing line in Brazil. The social media response and market reactions we’ve received in both markets are well above our expectations.
印度尼西亞和巴西是我們重點投入的另外兩個大型市場。我們在這兩個市場經營了自己的電子商務業務，正在快速培養自己的團隊，此外我們還在巴西建立了自己的生產線。我們在這兩個市場收穫的社交媒體互動與市場認同遠遠超過原本的預期。
We are currently focused on the preparations to enter a few new markets, such as Africa, and hope to have some announcements soon.
目前我們正專注於進入非洲等全新市場前的準備工作，希望能儘快將最新進展公佈給大家。
Q. Xiaomi is evaluating the market in Africa. What kinds of African countries offer the most promising markets? Cellphones made such a dramatic change for people in Africa who had never had a landline and barely knew what a phone was. A cellphone meant farmers could more easily market their produce, that women could do microfinance more easily. What are the latest trends in smartphone use in Africa that change lives in a fundamental way? How will Xiaomi capitalize on those trends?
問：小米正在對非洲市場進行評估。非洲哪些國家的市場是最具潛力的？非洲的很多人從未有過固話，甚至很多人不知道電話是什麼，但手機讓非洲人民的生活產生了翻天覆地的變化。有了手機，意味着農夫可以更方便地推銷自己的農產品，婦女可以更輕鬆地辦理小額信貸業務。非洲人民通過智能手機徹底改變了生活，這一領域最新的趨勢是什麼？小米打算如何抓住這些趨勢？
A. Landline voice infrastructure in Africa never reached most residential areas due to economic reasons, so people had enormous difficulties in communicating with each other, often having to send messengers or travel. The revolution that cellphones have brought about in Africa, therefore, is primarily centered around communications, allowing people to make calls and exchange messages in real time. The two biggest innovations that drove this revolution in Africa were, one, the prepaid model in the 1990s and, two, smartphones becoming popular over the last couple of years.
答：由於經濟原因，非洲的語音固定電話基礎設施從來沒有真正覆蓋到大部分非洲人民，人們之間的交流曾存在很大困難，以前只能靠寫信或出遊。因此，智能手機帶給非洲人民的革命浪潮主要圍繞通信這一領域，幫助人們實時通話和傳遞信息。在非洲引發通信革命的兩個最大創新包括，其一，二十世紀九十年代的預付費模式；其二，則是過去幾年裏逐漸流行起來的智能手機。
Africa is only starting to make the switch to smartphones. Of current sales, about 60 percent are smartphones in South Africa, about 50 percent in Kenya and about 25 percent in Nigeria. Only a fraction of the installed cellphone base is made up by smartphones and most people are yet to switch.
智能手機在非洲的普及工作纔剛剛開始。在當前的銷售中，智能手機在南非佔有60%的銷量，在肯尼亞佔50%，在尼日利亞佔25%。已經投入使用的手機中，智能手機只佔據很小的份額，大部分人尚未更新換代。
In terms of Internet services in recent years, communications, social media, information and entertainment — the usual suspects: WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, Google, YouTube — gained huge popularity and became dominant, leading to great improvement in the overall quality of life of the African population. Aside from these services, there are no apps that fundamentally change people’s lives in a large scale quite yet, such as on-demand transportation, O2O [online-to-offline] services, etc., because these services require integration with infrastructure that isn’t yet well developed in Africa.
在近些年的互聯網服務方面，通信、社交媒體、信息和娛樂——例如最常見的那些：WhatsApp、Facebook、Twitter、Google、YouTube——廣受歡迎，併成爲市場的主導，這些服務使得非洲人民的整體生活質量有了極大提高。除了這些服務，目前還沒有其他哪款應用能夠在大範圍內從根本上改變人們的生活，例如按需交通、O2O[線上到線下]服務等，因爲這些服務需要充分融入龐大的基礎設施中，而非洲尚不具備這樣的條件。
Currently, the African smartphone market has two extremes: one, luxurious brands playing at the high end with prices inaccessible by 95 percent of the population, and, two, ultralow-quality products at the bottom end which are, for all practical purposes, essentially just feature phones with a touch screen, and little to no after-sales support. The African market is also notable for not having proper consumer protection regulation in place in most countries, which makes it possible for vendors to easily take advantage of consumers.
目前，非洲的智能手機市場存在兩個極端：一，高端奢侈品牌，其售價是95%的人民無法承受的；二，最底層的，非常低質的產品，以實用爲首要目標，基本上只是具備觸屏的功能機，售後支持服務也很少，甚至完全沒有。非洲市場還有一個問題值得我們注意，大部分國家並沒有妥善的消費者保障制度，因此供應商有可能存在“店大欺客”的行爲。
The opportunity for Xiaomi in Africa is enormous, i.e. to offer high-quality smartphones with fast processors, large displays and long battery life, with the goal of driving up adoption of mobile Internet services, at affordable prices and reliable after-sales service and support.
小米可以在非洲市場獲得巨大的機遇，例如提供處理器更快、屏幕更大、電池續航更長的高質量智能手機，而我們的目標是以可承擔的實惠價格以及可靠的售後服務和支持，促進非洲人民對移動互聯網服務的接受。
Q. Will Xiaomi extend what you call the ecosystem — the production of Xiaomi products as varied as the Mi Band and the Xiaomi air purifier — outside China?
問：小米是否會將你們所稱的生態系統，即小米旗下種類豐富的產品，例如小米手環和小米空氣淨化器，擴展到中國之外？
A. We are already selling some of our ecosystem products outside of China. The Mi Band and our range of Power Banks, for example, are available in almost all our global markets. It takes time to introduce more of them to other markets since these products have to be localized, thoroughly tested and certified in each market, but we are actively working on a few international ecosystem projects with our ecosystem partners.
答：我們的一些生態系統產品已經開始在中國之外銷售了。例如小米手環和我們的各系列移動電源已經在全球幾乎所有市場上線。要將更多產品引入其他市場，這需要花費一定的時間，因爲這些產品需要針對每個市場進行本地化，進行充分的測試，並獲得相應的認證，但我們正在與生態系統合作伙伴一起，針對幾個國際生態系統項目展開積極合作。
Q. Why do you think overseas companies like Uber and Airbnb are doing well in China?
問：爲什麼你會認爲優步(Uber)和Airbnb等外國公司目前在中國的表現很好？
A. They’ve done what they’re best at — finding and hiring great talent and focusing a large share of their energy and resources towards markets with tremendous potential. I believe both Uber and Airbnb look at China with the same level of priority as the U.S. market these days, and I believe that is exactly the way to go about it.
答：它們做了自己最爲擅長的事——尋找並聘用優秀的人才，把很大一部分的精力和資源都集中在具有巨大潛力的市場上。我相信優步和Airbnb近來都把中國視作與美國同等重要的市場，而我認爲這正是最好的方針。
Q. People in China use smartphones in different ways and more intensely than in the U.S. With the popularity of WeChat and mobile payments, people in China seem to be using smartphones more creatively than in the U.S. Does that make China the leader in future smartphone innovations? Should U.S. companies pay closer attention to how Chinese are using their phones to gauge future usage patterns in the U.S.?
問：和美國人相比，中國人使用智能手機的方法不同，使用強度更大。隨着微信和移動支付的普及，中國人對智能手機的用法似乎比美國人的更有創意。這會令中國引領未來智能手機的革新嗎？美國公司應不應該更加關注中國人對手機的用法，藉此來估計美國將來的使用方式？
A. The mobile Internet has been evolving at a faster pace in China compared to any other market, as a result of fast consumer adoption of smartphones, extremely heavy competition among the leading Chinese Internet players as well as start-ups, in addition to vast capital availability and extremely active social media platforms that fuel consumer adoption.
答：中國的移動互聯網市場比其他任何市場都發展得更快，消費者採用智能手機的速度十分迅猛，因此，中國互聯網業界的巨頭和初創公司同樣面對着異常激烈的競爭。此外，該產業擁有獲得鉅額資金的途徑，社交媒體平臺極爲活躍，這兩者亦加速了消費者對智能手機的採用。
China’s Internet companies have boundless ambitions in acquiring users on their platforms through many different types of innovative services — they also prioritize acquisition over monetization. Competition is intense amongst the large Internet players and start-ups alike. This environment is conducive to fast-paced innovation and continuous reinvention of business models, increasingly providing a glimpse of how smartphones could be used by consumers in the U.S. and the entire world in the future.
中國的互聯網公司都擁有無限的野心，希望通過種類繁多的創新服務，吸引用戶使用其平臺，它們亦把吸納用戶置於賺錢之前。大型互聯網公司與初創公司之間的競爭十分激烈。這個環境有利於創意快速發展，商業模式持續重塑改進，爲未來美國以及全世界消費者的智能手機用法提供了越來越多可借鑑的部分。
In fact, some of China’s Internet companies, including Xiaomi, Alibaba and Cheetah Mobile, have started their international forays with very encouraging results so far. Other Chinese players are likely to follow and enter markets such as U.S. and India, which will intensify competition in the tech industry. U.S. Internet companies will learn and become more nimble in the process, which benefits consumers at the end of the day.
事實上，包括小米、阿里巴巴和獵豹移動在內的部分中國互聯網公司已經開始向國際市場進軍，目前亦獲得了相當鼓舞人心的成績。其他中國公司很可能會緊隨其後，進入美國和印度等市場，這將加劇科技產業的競爭。通過這個過程，美國的互聯網公司會從中學習並變得更加靈活，最終使消費者受惠。
Q. Virtual reality is considered a potential next big innovation. Some phone companies are making special V.R. headsets. How does Xiaomi see V.R.?
問：虛擬實境被認爲是下一個可能實現的重大創新技術。有些手機公司已經在研發特殊的虛擬實境頭戴設備。小米是怎樣看待虛擬實境的呢？
A. We are excited about the potential of V.R. technology, which we believe is still in its early stages of development, and we’re watching this space closely.
答：我們對虛擬實境的潛力感到很興奮。我們相信這種技術仍處於發展初期，現正密切留意着這個範疇的發展。
Q. Xiaomi has done so well being price-competitive, and Xiaomi prides itself on that. Is Xiaomi tempted to do a special, limited, top-of-the-line luxury smartphone where price is not a consideration for the consumer?
問：小米產品的價格十分有競爭力，而小米亦以此爲傲。小米有沒有想過要做一款特別、限量、業內頂尖、且價格並不是消費者考量因素的豪華智能手機呢？
A. Since the release of its first smartphone in 2011, Xiaomi has always been focused on releasing devices with top-end specifications and the highest quality components in the industry. For example, Mi Note Pro is Xiaomi’s latest flagship device and not only was one of the very first smartphones to ship with the fastest Qualcomm processor in existence — the Snapdragon 810 — but also pioneered a curved 3-D glass-back design that makes it one of the most premium products in the market, along with hi-fi audio subsystem, a dual-charging circuit and several other features not yet found in most of today’s devices, even at the highest end of the market. The main difference compared to other manufacturers is that in Xiaomi’s philosophy, top quality does not have to translate into high prices.
答：自2011年推出首款智能手機起，小米一直專注於推出具有高端規格和業內最優質零件的產品。例如小米Note Pro便是小米最新的旗艦產品，它不僅是市場上首批少數內置有高通公司(Qualcomm)現有最快的處理器驍龍810(Snapdragon 810)的智能手機，還首創了3D曲面玻璃背面設計，配備有hi-fi音樂系統、兩個充電電路和其他幾個功能，這些功能在現今的大部分產品、甚至在市場上最高端的產品上都難以找到。小米和其他廠家的主要區別在於其宗旨——高品質並不就等於高價格。
