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Turning the page
翻開新篇章
Microsoft and Barnes & Noble write their own love story
微軟公司與巴諾公司握手言和，共譜傳奇
LAST July Barnes & Noble gave a presentation to the antitrust division of America's Department of Justice. In slide after slide, the bookseller laid into Microsoft. The software giant, it thundered, was guilty of "anti-competitive behaviour" in demanding royalties from makers of mobile devices (such as the Nook, Barnes & Noble's e-reader) that used Android, Google's open-source mobile operating system. The bookseller sniffed that Microsoft owned only "trivial" patents and reminded the department of the software company's past trespasses against competition.
去年七月，美國圖書零售商巴諾公司為聯邦司法部的反壟斷局做過一次演講。隨著幻燈片逐張翻過，巴諾公司指責微軟公司的意圖也顯露了出來。在指責中，軟件巨頭微軟公司被認為通過"壟斷性"戰略強迫向移動設備制造收取版權稅。使用了谷歌開源系統——安卓系統的產品都在受影響之列，其中就包括巴諾公司的電子閱讀器Nook。不過這個圖書零售公司也敏銳的發現微軟公司持有的都是些"無足輕重的"專利，他們通過演講讓司法部門想起了微軟公司過去競爭中表現出的侵略性行為。
Nine months later, the bookworms and the geeks are the best of friends. On April 30th Barnes & Noble said it was creating a subsidiary, called NewCo for now, into which it would put Nook and its "college" business, which has 641 bookshops on American campuses. Microsoft is putting up $300m for 17.6% of NewCo. People will be able to buy and read e-books through a Nook application for Windows 8, a new incarnation of Microsoft's operating system that is due to appear in a few months. Microsoft will pay NewCo an advance of $180m over three years for such purchases, plus $125m over five years to buy content and develop technology. The squabbles over patents have been settled: Microsoft is giving Barnes & Noble a licence for the Nook and will get royalties in return. For now at least, the Nook will remain an Android, not Windows, device.
九個月之后，書蟲和技術宅成為了最好的朋友。4月30號，巴諾公司聲明正在創建一家子公司，并由其代行Nook銷售業務以及校園業務。現在名為NewCo的這家子公司已經在美國大學中有641家書店。微軟花3億美元購買了NewCo公司17.6%的股權。不久的將來，人們將可以通過Nook應用程序在windows 8操作系統上購買并閱讀電子書。Nook的windows版本即將于幾月后推出。微軟將向NewCo支付1.8億美元作為三年的購買費用，同時還支付了1.25億美元購買五年的內容和技術升級。關于知識產權的爭端也得以解決：微軟為巴諾的Nook閱讀器提供授權，而巴諾則向微軟支付版權稅。不過至少目前，Nook仍是在安卓設備上運行，而非windows。
The agreement values NewCo at $1.7 billion, more than twice Barnes & Noble's market capitalisation before it was announced. The bookseller's share price rose by 50% on the day of the deal—which tells you what investors think of the dead-tree end of the trade. The alliance should bring Barnes & Noble not only cash but also new readers of digital books and magazines, especially outside the United States. In the fourth quarter of 2011, according to Tom Mainelli of IDC, a research firm, Barnes & Noble accounted for one-fifth of the 7m e-readers shipped in America—against a mighty three-quarters for Amazon, maker of the Kindle (see chart). But Barnes & Noble shipped no Nooks elsewhere, which helps explain why it had only 14% of the global market. Via the Nook app, non-Americans will also be able to leaf through Barnes & Noble's digital catalogue.
NewCo的最終協議價格是17億美元，比這個項目被宣布之前，巴諾的市值高出兩倍還多。完成交易的當天，圖書零售商的股價上升了50%，這足以說明投資者是如何看待這項老樹開新花的交易的。聯合的戰略不僅將為巴諾公司帶來現金，更將增加電子書與電子雜志的讀者數量，在美國之外更是如此。根據市場研究機構IDC的Tom Mainelli所述，美國本土銷售的7百萬電子閱讀器中，巴諾公司的產品占了1/5——與之相對的是亞馬遜公司生產的Kindle閱讀器：該產品的銷售占了美國本土交易的3/4（見圖表）。不過巴諾公司沒有在其他地方銷售Nook產品，這也解釋了為什么該產品只占全球14%的市場。通過Nook應用程序，美國之外的用戶也能夠翻閱巴諾公司的電子目錄。
Microsoft is in effect buying a second bash at a market where it made an early but unsuccessful start. It launched its own e-reader software all of 12 years ago. The deal with Barnes & Noble, bringing lots of content with it, may give people an extra reason to buy Windows 8 tablets (a likelier choice for e-reading than smartphones, laptops or desktops) when they appear.
微軟公司已是第二次涉足電子書市場，而它首次進入時并不成功。12年前，它曾經推廣過自家的電子閱讀軟件。現在與巴諾公司達成的協議也充實了微軟自家閱讀器軟件中的內容，用戶們因此有更多的理由在windows 8平板面世后選購它們。與智能手機、筆記本和臺式機相比，運行著Window 8操作系統的平板產品與電子閱讀器的相似度更高。
The bundling of Barnes & Noble's college business into NewCo indicates a hope that a fair few of these customers will be students. Allen Weiner of Gartner, another research firm, suggests that through campus bookshops Barnes & Noble could sell Windows devices pre-loaded with course material. Of course, others are after students' dollars too. Apple recently started selling interactive digital textbooks for the iPad, far and away the biggest-selling tablet (among its publishing partners is Pearson, part-owner of The Economist). But Mr Weiner points out that Microsoft and Barnes & Noble have some advantages. Lots of students write notes and essays with Microsoft's Office software, which is not available on the iPad. And although Amazon sells and rents a lot of paper textbooks, it has not done much with digital ones. The tie-up with Barnes & Noble makes three of a kind for Microsoft: cheap deals with struggling but established partners in markets where it is weak and sees a chance to do much better. In 2009 it struck an agreement with Yahoo! in online search. Last year Nokia became the prime conduit for Windows in smartphones. With Barnes & Noble it is having another stab at e-reading. Unlike the books on the Nook, this tale is still being written.
巴諾公司在NewCo中大量捆綁自家業務的做法暗示了學生將占用戶群中的很大一部分。另一家調研公司Gartner的Allen Weiner建議道，巴諾公司可以在校園內銷售一些預裝了教材的windows產品。當然，其他的閱讀材料還是需要學生花錢購買的。蘋果公司近期開始銷售ipad上使用的數字互動教材，ipad是最暢銷的平板產品。經濟學人的持股人皮爾遜公司也是這些數字互動教材的發布方之一。但是Weiner先生指出微軟公司與巴諾公司也有自己的優勢。大量的學生利用微軟的office軟件書寫筆記與評論，但是ipad卻不能運行office軟件。而盡管亞馬遜借出并銷售大量的紙質版教材，但是在數字產品上，他還遠遠落后于競爭對手。與巴諾公司的聯合把微軟公司拉到了與ipad，亞馬遜同一起跑線的位置：在自身影響力不足但是未來前景廣闊的市場上與一家比較成熟，但還有些小問題的公司廉價建立了聯系。在2009年，微軟公司成功與雅虎簽訂在線搜索業務方面的協議。去年諾基亞成為了讓windows系統進駐智能手機的主要途徑。而與巴諾公司的合作一定可以讓微軟公司在電子閱讀器市場扎穩腳步。與Nook的故事不同，這段新傳奇正被續寫。
