小米生大財：Little rice，lots of dough

寫在前面

「沒有人能在我的BGM里打敗我。」

「掌握這些套路，英語突飛猛進。」

面對種種營銷手段的套路，你可能已經進化成老油條。

但學習，可沒有套路。

聯萌團隊重「XīN」出發，升級精讀模式，回歸外刊本身，提煉地道表達，邀你輕裝上陣學英語。

原文

Xiaomi to go public

Little rice, lots of dough

Reinvigorated,the world』s fourth-largest smartphone-maker eyes a giant IPO.

IN CHINA no company achieved $1bn in annual revenue as quickly as Xiaomi did, in the year following the launch of its first smartphone in 2011. Chinese media initially nicknamed Xiaomi the 「Apple of the East」 (its literal translation is 「little rice」). That was a stretch, even in good times. But within another two years theaffordable handset-maker became the world』s most valuable startup, worth $46bn.

Analysts reckon that it now wants to raise up to $10bn in an initial public offering (IPO) on Hong Kong』s stock exchange which was announced on May 3rd. (Its filing documents disclose neither the valuation that it is seeking, nor a fundraising target.) That could afford it a very generous valuation of as much as $80bn—not far off the $91bn market capitalisation of Baidu,China』s biggest search engine and one of the country』s three 「BAT」 tech titans alongside Alibaba and Tencent.

Yet only 18 months ago such talk would have seemed outlandish. In 2016 Xiaomi』s sales fell sharply and it tumbled from first to fifth place among Chinese handset-makers. Lei Jun, its founder, blamed clogged supply chains at a time of rapid growth. Many thought it had overstretched, launching internet-connected gadgets, from rice cookers to drones, to create an ecosystem of devices that could be controlled from smartphones. Sales of these gizmos and Xiaomi』slow-cost but high specification handsetsaccounted for 91% of its $18bn in revenues last year, yet they made only wafer-thin gross profits of 8.8%, a small fraction of the 39% that Apple makes on its iPhones.

Since then, Xiaomi hasbounced backagain. At a launch event in Shanghai in March for the MIX2S phone, Mr Lei strode on stage in gleaming white trainers in a stadium filled with Mi-Fans, as the company calls its devotees, claiming that his newest smartphone had 「crushed」 Apple』s iPhoneX. There was much cooing at the unveiling of the Mi Gaming Laptop, which allows users to place a food-delivery order mid-game with a programmable button.

AresurgentXiaomi wagers that its Mi-Fans, to whom it has regularly turned online for ideas and feedback, are loyal, and that「amazing products」 at 「honest prices」will encourage more people to snap up its phones. It says that already1.4m users own more than five of its hardware products. By 2022 it expects to generate $10bn in annual revenues from 1,000 physical Mi stores that sell its phones, laptops and some of its 300-odd lifestyle gadgets (mainly built by startups in which Xiaomi has stakes). Last month Mr Lei announced, to the horror of some potential investors, that he would aim to keep overall net profit margins for all of this hardware under 5%. For a long time his approach has been to make money on internet services byluringusers into the Xiaomi universe with unbeatable handset prices.

The firm does indeed make its fattest gross margins, of 60%, through services and ads on Xiaomi-developed apps that are pre-loaded on to its home-grown MIUI operating system, a tweaked version of Android. These include Mi Music for streaming audio, for instance, and its own Mi App Store. The average revenue per user of MIUI doubled between 2015 and 2017. A banker who has helped prepare its listing sees big moneymaking potential inIndia, where Xiaomi overtook Samsung at the end of last year as the country』s top selling smartphone-maker, a major reason for its bounce-back. Last year 28% of Xiaomi』s sales came from foreign markets, up from 6% in 2015. Remarkably, in the first quarter of 2018, it made over half of its sales abroad, among the first ofChina』s firms to do so.

Possible snags abound. Huawei, a domestic rival, grew faster than Xiaomi inIndiain the first three months of this year. Neil Shah of Counterpoint Research in Mumbai says that in foreign markets, where Google』s services are not blocked (unlike in China), Xiaomi will find it hard to sustain its services-based profit model. Mr Lei had been hoping to take his phones to America this year, but as troubles mount for Chinese peers such as Huawei and ZTE, it is 「now unlikely to pour resources into such a tough market」, says Shelly Jing of IDC, another market-research firm. At home it will be under pressure to increase the average price—and quality—of its phones (currently 881 yuan, or $138) as veteran smartphone buyers are tempted by its rivals』 higher-end models. Excluding onetime charges, Xiaomi』s net income was a relatively modest $700m last year.

If the latest estimates are accurate, this flotation will be the biggest IPO since Alibaba fetched $21.8bn in New York in 2014. Xiaomi is eager to prove to investors that it is an internet company, and so deserves higher valuations than a simple hardware firm. It claims that more than 100m devices have been connected to its 「internet-of things」 platform. Its array of investments in over 210 companies lend it the air of an incubator. Fu Sheng, who founded Cheetah Mobile, a leading maker of utility apps for smartphones, says that BAT may soon become 「ATM」. M for Xiaomi would replace B for Baidu.

——選自20180512期《經濟學人》

雙語精讀筆記

知識點1：Little rice, lots of dough

這篇文章主要講述了全球第四大智能手機生產商—小米如今強勢回歸，有望成為2018年全球最大IPO。這篇文章的標題很有意思，little rice，rice（米）本是不可數名詞，little用來形容rice，指很少的，微少的，這裡代指小米；dough本意是指麵包，在古代沒有貨幣的時候，人們將麵包作為貨幣使用，逐漸地，dough也就衍生出了「錢」的意思。

標題中Little和lots of 對比，一個很少、幾乎沒有，一個很多；而rice和dough從外形上對比來看，自然是麵糰要比米粒大的多，結合文章對小米即將上市的描述，所以這篇文章題目可以理解為小米生大財。

知識點2：「重新振作，強勢回歸」要怎麼說？

小米在經歷了供應鏈不暢、銷量下滑的低谷期後，小米打開了海外市場，尤其是在印度取代三星成為最暢銷手機，這是小米能夠強勢回歸的最主要原因。平時我們所說的重振雄風、強勢回歸、重新振作、恢復生機、復興等等，其實都表達的是某人或物由發展繁榮，到經歷了低谷期然後又再次繁榮這樣的過程。文中對於小米的強勢回歸有多次描述，讓我們來一一學習下：

Reinvigorated, the world』s fourth-largest smartphone-maker eyes a giant IPO.

全球第四大智能手機製造商重振雄風，發行巨型IPO。

首先是引文中的話，Reinvigorate由re+invigorate組成，re前綴表示「再，重新」，invigorate表示「使……精力充沛」，reinvigorate sb可以表示使某人再振作起來，比如：fresh air reinvigorates me新鮮空氣讓我精神煥發；reinvigorate sth指使某物復興，reinvigorate ecomon復興經濟。文中的reinvigorated是它的過去分詞作為伴隨狀語，置於句首表示作為全球第4大智能手機製造商的小米現在的狀態是已經重新振作，後面的是主句，概述了小米現在要做的事兒是開啟大型IPO。

Since then, Xiaomi hasbouncedback again.

從那以後，小米又強勢回歸。

在文章第四段第一句話中出現了Bounce back這個片語，意思是「反彈、迅速恢復活力、重新振作」。Bounce本意是彈，彈跳，在諾基亞經典款手機上曾經有一款經典小遊戲「Bounce」，中文名為蹦球歷險，彈跳小球來通過重重關卡，用bounce形容十分形象。

片語Bounce back字面意思是反彈，引申義為to return quickly to a normal condition after a difficult situation or event，通常是指經歷過一段困難或低谷後迅速恢復，看下面的例句：

Shebounced back[=recovered] easily from her surgery.（在說到從手術中恢復時我們還可以用recover）

After losing the first three games of the series, theybounced backto win their next eight games.

AresurgentXiaomi wagers that its Mi-Fans, to whom it has regularly turned online for ideas and feedback, are loyal, and that 「amazing products」 at 「honest prices」 will encourage more people to snap up its phones.

復興起來的小米將賭注下在了它的粉絲和產品上，一方面，小米的死忠「米粉」們經常在網上提出意見和反饋，忠誠度高；另一方面，小米產品質優價廉，「令人驚艷的產品」有著「誠實的價格」，使得更多的人搶購小米手機。

在文章第五段的開頭說到了復興的小米……，這裡用到了形容詞resurgent，英文釋義為becoming popular, active, or successful again after a period of being less popular, active, or successful，也表示重新興起的，復興的，後可以直接加名詞，比如a resurgent stock market或a resurgent politician。

知識點3：「物美價廉」、「經濟實惠」要怎麼說？

相比起價格昂貴的蘋果手機，小米智能手機以物美價廉吸引了一大批忠實的「米粉」。我們在購物時通常會選擇物美價廉、價格實惠的商品，這裡包含了兩個意思，質量好和價格低，我們先來學習文中的表達：

But within another two years theaffordablehandset-maker became the world』s most valuable startup, worth $46bn.

但在之後的兩年，這家平價手機製造商成為全球市值最高的初創企業，市值達到460億美元。

在第一段中最後一句話里，用Affordable來形容小米，Affordable形容詞，指多數人可以買的起的，也就是價格實惠的，平價的，文中的affordable handset便可以理解為平價手機的意思。所以我們在說某個東西價格實惠，平價時，可以用affordable來表示，比如平價電腦Affordable computer，還有我們常說的「經濟適用房」或「保障性住宅」便是 affordable housing，平價奢侈品affordable luxury.

that「amazing products」 at 「honest prices」will encourage more people to snap up its phones 「令

人驚艷的產品」有著「誠實的價格」，使得更多的人搶購小米手機。

在第五段第一句話中作者用「amazing products」 at 「honest prices」來形容小米手機，amazing product指小米產品讓人驚艷，著重強調其質量好，honest prices指小米手機在價格上很誠實，也就是價格低。類似的表達結構其實很常見，比如high quality products at/with reasonable/competitive/unbeatable price，具體使用可以根據上下文替換中間的關鍵詞，比如：

High quality smartphone withunbeatable pricehas put Xiaomi on the map.

小米智能手機物美價廉，廣受歡迎。

文中類似的說法還有：

Sales of these gizmos and Xiaomi』slow-cost but high specification handsets（低成本高規格） accounted for 91% of its $18bn in revenues last year.

去年公司總營業收入180億美元，其中91%來源於這些新發明的小物件以及性價比高的手機。

除了文中提到的用法，物美價廉還有一個地道的表達cheap and cheerful，通常用來指那些便宜又實用，消費者買到很開心的產品。比如：

My parents enjoy getting up early in the morning and shopping forcheap and cheerfulthings in the supermarket.

父母輩的人總喜歡早起去淘那些質優價廉的東西。

需要注意的是，雖然以上的幾個詞均可以指「經濟實惠」、「物美價廉」的意思，但是側重有不同：affordable「可以買的起的、價格實惠的」，可以用來指那些價格低的產品（小到手機、衣服等小物件），也可以用來指價格高的商品（大到房子、汽車等等）；第二個例句中的結構比較靈活，只需根據上下文和自己表達需要,來替換形容詞和名詞既可（形容詞+名詞+at/with+形容詞+price），這個表達既可以用來指物美價廉，也可以用來形容其他不同品質不同價格水準的產品；第三個地道表達建議大家僅使用於價格低的小物件。如果大家還有更好的表達，歡迎在評論區補充。

知識點4：「誘導用戶」怎麼說？

在說到誘導用戶時，可能有人會想到用「attract users」，但是除了這個表達，還有沒有更加生動形象的說法呢？我們先來看下文章中的表達：

For a long time his approach has been to make money on internet services byluringusers into the Xiaomi universe with unbeatable handset prices.

在很長一段時間裡，他一直通過用低價手機誘導用戶使用小米，從而在互聯網服務上賺錢。

這是第五段的最後一句話，解釋了小米盈利的方式。這句話中使用了luring users into the Xiaomi universe，誘導用戶進入小米世界，用了「lure」這個單詞，Lure 引誘、誘惑，通常是指用一些誘餌來引誘動物；或者給一些好處來說服、勸服某人來做某事。

在今年1月20日的經濟學人封面文Taming the titans中也有類似的表達，Facebook keeps buying firms which could one daylureusersaway意思是Facebook一直在收購那些有朝一日可能會分流其用戶的公司。文中的lure users away(from facebook) 意思為誘導用戶不再使用facebook，所以翻譯成為「分流其用戶」。

此外，在微信的使用條款中有這樣一條規定，禁止誘導分享和關注，在英文版中的表達是Induceother users to click on the link pages or share information.這裡的誘導用的是Induce。

綜上，誘導用戶，實質是以某種方式去吸引用戶去做某事，簡單直白版的表達有attract users，進階版表達除了有上面提到的lure, induce, 還有tempt和entice，需要注意的是lure/entice/tempt均表達了這種通過某種有趣或誘人的方式吸引人，而induce與其它三者相比，詞性更為中立，傾向於指事件的引發。

如需原文譯文，請發送「小米」至後台即可獲取。

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