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2022考研英语经济学人:押注自动驾驶,寻找下一个风口

Robin Li smiled when asked at a corporate shindig in 2014 to reflect on his path to becoming, at the time, China’s richest man. “I’m just lucky,” he insisted. Mr Li, co-founder and boss of Baidu, a Beijing-based search engine, may have been trying to project modesty.

在2014年的一次企业聚会上，当被问及他是如何成为当时中国首富时，李彦宏只是笑了笑。他总说：“我只是运气好。”作为总部位于北京的搜索引擎公司百度的联合创始人和老板，李彦宏是或许一直试图展现其谦逊的一面。

But his words could also have been taken literally. That leaves Baidu as the unrivalled leader in Chinese search. Slowing advertising revenues, however, are now taking it down a different road.

但他的话或许也能从字面上理解。由于谷歌退出了中国市场，这使得百度成为了中国搜索领域无可匹敌的霸主。然而，广告收入的放缓正在让其走上另一条路。

Baidu’s search dominance is indisputable. Its average of 538m monthly active users last year was nearly six times the combined total of the next three domestic rivals. Baidu’s share price has tripled in a year, taking its market capitalisation to $93bn.

百度在搜索领域的霸主地位是毋庸置疑的。去年，百度月均活跃用户达5.38亿，几乎是紧随其后的三家国内竞争对手用户总和的6倍。百度的股价在一年内上涨了两倍，使其市值达到930亿美元。

Riding this wave of investor enthusiasm, it has filed for a secondary listing in Hong Kong, with trading set to begin on March 23rd. The firm is expected to raise around $4bn. But the steep rise in Baidu’s valuation might seem unwarranted.

乘着投资者热情高涨，百度已申请在香港进行二次上市，交易定于3月23日开始。百度预计通过此次上市筹资约40亿美元。但其估值的大幅上升似乎毫无根据。

Advertising, the main source of revenue, has suffered as the pandemic forced Chinese businesses to cut marketing budgets. Adverts on Baidu’s main search service brought in 66.3bn yuan ($9.6bn) in 2020, 5% less than the year before.

由于疫情迫使中国企业纷纷削减了营销预算，作为百度主要收入来源的广告受到了影响。2020年，作为百度主要收入来源的搜索服务为其带来了663亿元人民币(约合96亿美元)的广告营收，相比前一年减少了5%。

Even as China’s economy recovers advertising is unlikely to propel Baidu’s growth as powerfully as before. In recent years the supply of digital ad space in China has multiplied, depressing prices. Businesses can now choose from an array of platforms on which to hawk their wares—from addictive video apps like Kuaishou to e-commerce upstarts like Pinduoduo.

即使在中国经济复苏之际，广告也不太可能像从前那样有力推动百度的增长。近年来，中国数字广告空间供应量的成倍增长压低了广告的价格。商家现在可以在一系列平台(从让人上瘾的短视频应用快手到电商新贵拼多多)中做出选择，以售卖其产品。

Baidu’s bosses appear to recognise as much. The firm is rapidly diversifying. Last November it agreed to buy YY Live, a video-sharing and live-streaming app, for $3.6bn, in a bid to boost its presence in online entertainment and compete with the likes of Kuaishou.

百度的老板似乎也意识到了这一点。该公司正在迅速实现业务多元化。去年11月，百度以36亿美元的价格收购了视频互动直播应用YY直播，以增强其在在线娱乐领域的影响力，并与快手等公司展开竞争。

Baidu is also investing heavily in cloud services to keep up with Alibaba and Tencent, two bigger Chinese tech rivals. But arguably the boldest push is what the company calls “intelligent driving”.

此外，百度还在云服务领域投入巨资，以追赶其在中国的两大科技竞争对手阿里巴巴和腾讯。但要说百度最大胆的一次尝试则是其所谓的“自动驾驶”。

This business contributes hardly any revenues today but holds “huge long-term monetisation potential”, according to Baidu’s new prospectus. The business has three prongs. The first is the establishment of a nationwide fleet of robotaxis powered by Apollo, Baidu’s in-house self-driving technology.

百度最新的招股说明书显示，这项业务目前几乎没有贡献任何收入，但拥有“巨大的长期盈利潜力”。百度的自动驾驶业务有着三步走战略。其一是在全国范围内建立一支由阿波罗(百度内部的自动驾驶技术)驱动的自动驾驶出租车车队。今年1月，该公司获准在加州展开自动驾驶汽车测试。

The firm is already operating self-driving taxis in three Chinese cities, including part of Beijing. Rides are currently free but Baidu hints that it may soon start charging. It has international ambitions, too. In January it received permission to test self-driving cars in California.

百度已经在中国三大城市开展自动驾驶出租车运营，其中包括北京部分地区。人们目前可免费乘坐，但百度暗示，该业务或将很快开始收费。百度还有着出海的野心。

Baidu also plans to mass-produce electric vehicles (EVs). In January it formed a new venture with Geely, a Chinese carmaker, to bring to market “intelligent” (if not fully autonomous) EVs within three years. By 2035 China’s government wants every other new car sold to be an EV.

其二，百度还计划大规模生产电动汽车。今年1月，百度与中国汽车制造商吉利共同成立了一家新的合资企业，计划在三年内将“智能”(就算不是完全自动驾驶)的电动汽车推向市场。中国希望，到2035年，所有在售新车均为电动汽车。

The third prong allows Baidu to earn immediate revenues by selling services to Chinese carmakers, such as high-definition maps and automated-parking technology, which it has already sold to ten firms. Baidu is already a late entrant to China’s crowded personal-mobility industry. For now, at least, investors are on for the ride.

其三，百度还将通过向中国汽车制造商销售高清地图和自动停车技术等服务来赚取直接收入。百度已向10家公司提供这些服务。在竞争激烈的个人出行行业，百度算是一个后来者。至少就目前而言，投资者仍处于观望中。

 

重难点词汇：

unrivalled [ʌnˈraɪvld] adj. 无与伦比的;无敌的

indisputable [ˌɪndɪˈspjuːtəbl] adj. 不容置疑的;无可争辩的

prospectus [prəˈspektəs] n. 简章;招股章程

      以上是“2022考研英语经济学人:押注自动驾驶,寻找下一个风口”，希望对2022考研考生们，在英语阅读上面有所帮助!祝2022考研顺利!

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