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Tata to the rescue

塔塔伸出援手

英文部分選自經(jīng)濟學(xué)人20190216中Business版塊

The car industry (1)

汽車工業(yè)

Tata to the rescue

塔塔伸出援手

Jaguar Land Rover, Britain’s biggest carmaker, is in a hole

英國最大汽車制造商捷豹路虎深陷泥潭

Range rovers, the pricey range-topping models from Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), flaunt interiors swagged in leather and wood. Such opulence distracts attention from the car’s capability as a rugged off-roader, as adept at driving up a mountainside as gliding around the smartest part of town. JLR’s ability to haul itself out of the mire is also about to undergo a serious test.

捷豹路虎高端車型路虎攬勝，價格不菲，以真皮和實木為主的內(nèi)飾，散發(fā)著張揚的氣息。如此的奢華分散了人們對其強悍越野性能的注意力：既擅長行駛在崎嶇不平的山路上，也擅長在城鎮(zhèn)最繁華的地段滑行。（如今）捷豹路虎 拖拽自身走出泥潭的能力也將面臨著嚴峻的考驗。

After a string of quarterly losses, on February 7th JLR revealed another, of ￡273m ($351m) in the latest three-month period. On top of that there was a whopping asset write-down, of ￡3.1bn. In the immediate aftermath, shares in its parent company, Tata Motors, which is the car making arm of the Indian conglomerate, collapsed by 18% and have now fallen by 60% in the past year. Tata Motors relies on JLR for about 80% of its sales and all of its profits. Despite the blow, Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Group as well as the car division, says his company is committed to JLR and determined to turn it around.

在經(jīng)歷了一連串的季度虧損之后，2月7日，捷豹路虎披露最近三個月里再度虧損2.73億歐元(合3.51億美元)。最重要的是，資產(chǎn)減記幅度高達31億英鎊。緊接其后，其母公司塔塔汽車的股價暴跌了18%，并在過去一年中總計下跌了60%。塔塔汽車是印度企業(yè)集團的汽車制造部門。而塔塔汽車80%的銷售和所有利潤都依賴于捷豹路虎。盡管受此重擊，塔塔集團(Tata Group)董事長兼汽車部門董事長納塔拉揚·錢德拉塞克蘭(Natarajan Chandrasekaran)已承諾，公司將致力于扭轉(zhuǎn)捷豹路虎的局面。

It would not be the first turnaround. When Tata acquired JLR from Ford in 2008 it was close to bankruptcy. Since then sales have tripled, to over 600,000 cars a year in 2017. Profits have rolled in. But Ralf Speth, a former bmw executive hired to lead JLR on a route to catch its German rivals, may in recent years have gone too far, too fast. He pushed to sell 1m cars a year to help spread the costs of developing future technology.

這種轉(zhuǎn)變并非第一次發(fā)生。2008年塔塔從福特手中收購捷豹路虎時，它就已經(jīng)瀕臨破產(chǎn)。但塔塔接手之后，捷豹路虎的銷量翻了兩倍，截至2017年全年銷量已逾60萬輛。利潤滾滾而來。不過，寶馬前高管拉爾夫·斯皮思(Ralf Speth，中文名字施韋德)就任帶領(lǐng)捷豹路虎走上追趕德國競爭對手之路后，近年來或許走得太遠、步伐太快了。為了分攤開發(fā)未來技術(shù)的成本，他力促年銷100萬輛汽車。

JLR hit the brakes in 2018. Sales volumes fell by 5% worldwide in the 12 months to December, after plummeting in China at the end of the year (see chart) as the slowing economy put off buyers and Jaguar’s relationship with its dealers in the country deteriorated. The company now faces an array of problems. Its best market continues to collapse and it is reliant on increasingly unpopular diesel engines (which power the vast majority of its cars in Europe). Add to that the threat of American tariffs and a hard Brexit and the near future looks worrisome.

2018年，捷豹路虎踩了個急剎車。截止2018年12月的連續(xù)12個月里，其全球銷量下降了5%。而中國經(jīng)濟增長放緩，買家減少、捷豹與其在華經(jīng)銷商關(guān)系惡化，去年年底，中國市場銷量直線下降(見圖表)。這家公司現(xiàn)在面臨一系列的問題：其最好的市場持續(xù)崩潰，同時，它依賴的柴油發(fā)動機又越來越不受歡迎（該公司在歐洲銷售的絕大多數(shù)汽車都使用柴油發(fā)動機）。除此以外，美國的關(guān)稅和英國硬脫歐的威脅均使其前景堪憂。

Brexit and trade wars are out of JLR’s hands. Its huge bet on diesel engines and its poor handling of its Chinese dealers were not. The latter had to sell cars at a loss to meet stiff sales targets or keep them on forecourts—and have since refused to hold ever-growing inventories. JLR’s woes also owe much to its over ambition. Mr Speth spent freely and costs have soared.

但是，在柴油發(fā)動機上的豪賭以及對國內(nèi)經(jīng)銷商的糟糕處理方式，卻并非如此。為了達成嚴格的銷售目標，國內(nèi)經(jīng)銷商要么不得不虧本銷售汽車要么只能將汽車停放在展示廳里，并于此后拒絕持有不斷增長的庫存。捷豹路虎今日之困很大程度上源于其過于野心勃勃，斯皮思花錢大手大腳，成本飆升。

In going for growth JLR now spends too much making too many models for a carmaker of its size. Range Rovers are popular and the Evoque has been an unexpected success but the new Discovery and Velar have performed poorly. What to do with Jaguar is another conundrum. In the recent past the brand has probably never made an annual profit (Tata Motors does not break out figures). Mr Speth’s decision to invest in upmarket saloon cars, a contracting part of the market where the Germans have a stranglehold, looks a costly mistake. The XE and XF have never sold well. Mr Speth himself “may need to take responsibility for what’s gone wrong” says Robin Zhu of Bernstein, an equity-research firm.

為追求增長，捷豹路虎開發(fā)的車型過多，相關(guān)支出也過于龐大，遠超其規(guī)模。路虎攬勝很受歡迎，極光也取得了意想不到的成功，但新款發(fā)現(xiàn)和星脈卻表現(xiàn)不佳。捷豹何去何從則是另一個難題。最近一段時間，該品牌可能從未實現(xiàn)過年度盈利(塔塔汽車沒有公布具體數(shù)字)。斯皮思投資高檔轎車的決策，看起來是個代價高昂的錯誤。德國人控制下的高檔轎車市場正在不斷萎縮，捷豹xe和xf的銷量一直不佳。股票研究公司伯恩斯坦（Bernstein）的羅賓·朱（Robin Zhu）表示，斯皮思本人可能需要為出現(xiàn)的問題負責。

Tata, nevertheless, remains committed to the management that turned JLR from near bankruptcy to become the world’s fourth-largest luxury car brand. It plans to cut costs by ￡2.5bn over the next 18 months and will axe 4,500 jobs (around a tenth of the workforce) on top of 1,500 job losses announced in 2018. That should turn its cashflow positive by 2020-21, according to Tata.

不過，塔塔公司，曾將捷豹路虎從一家?guī)捉飘a(chǎn)的汽車公司轉(zhuǎn)變成為世界排名第四的豪華車品牌，如今也仍致力于扭轉(zhuǎn)捷豹路虎的局面。塔塔計劃在接下來的18個月時間內(nèi)削減逾25億英鎊的成本，在2018年裁員1500人的基礎(chǔ)上，將再削減4500個崗位（約占職員總數(shù)的十分之一）。塔塔稱，此舉擬在2020-2021年間將其現(xiàn)金流扭虧為正。

The Indian group’s judgment that JLR is a good business that will recover, seems sound. Tata may have washed its hands of Corus, another ailing British acquisition, putting the steelmaker into a joint venture with ThyssenKrupp of Germany last year, but it sees JLR as an important bet on new technology and thus the future. Jaguar may need to rethink what sort of cars it makes but Range Rover is among the most profitable brands in the business and updated models arriving in the next few years will give the firm a boost. If it can get through the next year, then concentrate on expensive suvs, JLR should get back on track.

塔塔集團認為捷豹路虎是一家優(yōu)質(zhì)企業(yè)，將會東山再起，這聽起來似乎很有道理。相比而言，對于收購的另一家處境不佳的英國企業(yè)康力斯（Corus），塔塔去年將其與德國蒂森克虜伯合并成立合資公司后，似乎打算不再過問。由此可見，塔塔公司將捷豹路虎視為對新技術(shù)即未來的一個重要押注?；蛟S捷豹需要重新思考要制造何種類型的汽車，而路虎攬勝則是汽車業(yè)中利潤最高的品牌之一，未來幾年里將推出的眾多新款車型也將提振路虎。捷豹路虎如果能在下一年里渡過難關(guān)，聚力于豪華SUV，就能夠重振旗鼓，東山再起。

翻譯組： 

Andy，男，咨詢民工，經(jīng)濟學(xué)人愛好者

Vambie，女，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)民工，經(jīng)濟學(xué)人粉絲

VeRy，男，電氣民工，經(jīng)濟學(xué)人資淺愛好者

校核組： 

Li Xia, 女， 愛爬山的健身小白， 美食狂人

Forest，女，自由職業(yè)，保持與自己的距離

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