商業報道
Steve Jobs resigns
斯蒂芬喬布斯辭職
The minister of magic steps down
魔法部長隱退
Can Silicon Valley's most disruptive firm prosper without its maker?
沒有了創始人,硅谷曾經最混亂的公司會繁榮起來嗎?
IN A commencement speech to students at Stanford University in 2005, Steve Jobs, the chief executive of Apple, advised his audience to avoid being trapped by dogma and to have the courage to follow their hearts and their intuition.
2005年,蘋果首席執行官斯蒂芬喬布斯在斯坦福大學畢業典禮上對學生們提出建議,不要被教條束縛,要勇于跟隨自己的內心和直覺。
“Stay hungry. Stay foolish,” he said as he signed off.
結束時,他說,永遠不要裹足不前。
By following his own advice, Mr Jobs, who resigned as Apple's boss on August 24th, has turned the company from a basket case on the brink of bankruptcy when he returned to its helm in 1997 into a world-beater that is reshaping a big chunk of the technology industry.
喬布斯于8月24日辭去蘋果總裁一職。就像他所說的那樣,自從1997年他登上蘋果的領導地位,他將這個毫無希望的瀕臨破產邊緣的公司帶入世界領先地位,并重建為科技產業的巨頭。
Earlier this month, Apple even briefly surpassed Exxon Mobil, an oil giant, to become the world's most valuable company.
就在這個月初,蘋果甚至超越了石油大腕埃克森美孚,成為世界上最有價值的公司。
No other boss in recent history has embodied and defined a firm as completely as Mr Jobs.
在近代史上,沒有一個人能像喬布斯那樣將一個公司做的如此風生水起。
So his decision to resign as chief executive has inevitably raised the question of whether Apple will remain as hungry and as wildly successful without its entrepreneurial maestro at the helm.
因此他辭去首席執行官的決定不可避免地引發了爭論—在其開拓者離開后,蘋果還能否保持前進的動力以及巨大的成功。
Other giants in the tech industry have seen their fortunes fade after iconic leaders have departed.
科技產業的其他大型公司,在招牌領導人離去后,財富就縮水了。
Microsoft has struggled to regain its mojo since Bill Gates stood down as its chief executive in January 2000.
2000年比爾蓋茨辭去微軟的首席執行官后,微軟經歷了一段困難時期才重拾輝煌。
Could Apple suffer a similar fate?
蘋果也會經歷同樣的命運嗎?
That seems unlikely for several reasons.
由于一些原因,蘋果可能不會經歷相同的命運。
One is that the company has had plenty of time to plan for this moment.
原因之一,公司有足夠的時間對現在進行規劃。
Mr Jobs has stepped aside from day-to-day management at Apple on a couple of occasions before, after having surgery for a rare form of pancreatic cancer in 2004.
喬布斯以前也有過不參與蘋果日常管理的時候,例如04年因胰腺癌接受手術的時期。
Each time, Tim Cook, Apple's chief operating officer, temporarily assumed his boss's responsibilities.
每次,都是由蘋果的首席運營官蒂姆庫克暫代總裁職位。
That allowed Mr Cook, who is taking over from Mr Jobs as CEO, to get a taste for the top spot—and it gave Apple's board a chance to see him in action.
這讓庫克嘗到了做第一把交椅的滋味,并且讓蘋果的董事會看到了他所起的作用。
On each occasion, Mr Cook kept Apple's money-making machine ticking over smoothly.
每一次,庫克都使蘋果有穩定的收入。
An expert in manufacturing and logistics, he closed down almost all of Apple's manufacturing operations after he arrived at the firm in the late 1990s and outsourced much of these to Asia.
他是一位制造學和后勤學的專家,在20世紀90年代末來到蘋果后,他幾乎撤銷了所有的制造工序,并將其轉包給亞洲國家。
Announcing his promotion, Apple's board said that he had shown “remarkable talent and sound judgment in everything he does.”
談到他的升職,蘋果董事會表示他所做的一切顯示了卓越的才能和非凡的決策力。
Talent is something that Apple also has an abundance of elsewhere in its ranks.
才能,是蘋果的高管最不缺乏的。
Executives such as Phil Schiller, who oversees the company's marketing, and Jonathan Ive, a Briton whose domain is design, are part of a team that has worked closely together for many years.
像是執行官菲爾席勒,他負責公司的營銷。還有喬納森伊夫,英國人,他負責設計。這兩個人都是蘋果隊伍的一員,隊員們已經協調合作了很多年。
If Mr Cook can keep this group intact, then Apple's future should be bright.
如果庫克能使這樣的隊伍繼續保持下去,蘋果的未來就是光明的。
The firm also benefits from an intensely loyal and motivated workforce. Glassdoor, an online jobs and careers community, carries reviews of the company from almost 1,000 Apple employees.
公司的成功還得益于忠實而有激情的職工們。玻璃門—一個在線職業聯盟——通過調查了大約1000名蘋果職工對該公司進行了檢驗。
Most are glowing about the firm and in particular about Mr Jobs's impact on it. One post even calls Apple's former boss “the Thomas Edison of this century”.
大部分職工對公司充滿熱情,并十分肯定喬布斯對公司的影響。一個帖子甚至稱蘋果前任總裁為“當代愛迪生”。
Paul Saffo of Discern Analytics, a financial-analytics company, reckons that this depth of loyalty will mean that even though Mr Jobs is stepping down, the firm's employees will continue to ask themselves “what would Steve do?” when making decisions.
保羅薩佛的識別分析—一個金融分析公司——猜想,這種程度的忠誠度意味著,即使喬布斯隱退,公司的員工們在做決定的時候依然會問自己“斯蒂夫將會如何做”。當然,提出問題比猜想正確答案要容易得多。
Another reason for optimism is that Mr Jobs is not disappearing from the scene entirely. Instead he is taking on a new role as the chairman of Apple's board, which should allow him to keep weighing in on important decisions for some time to come, assuming that his health allows.
人們可以抱有樂觀態度的另一原因是,喬布斯并沒有完全從舞臺上消失,他只不過是扮演了新的角色—蘋果董事會主席。如果他的健康狀況允許,他可以繼續權衡未來的重要決策。
Apple has a pretty clear product pipeline for the next couple of years, which is reassuring.
在接下來的幾年中,蘋果有一條非常清晰的生產線,人們大可放心。
The firm is due to unveil the latest version of its hugely successful iPhone in the coming weeks and is expected to launch a new iPad early next year.
在未來幾周內,蘋果將會揭開新版iphone的面紗,并在明年初將新一代ipad投放市場。
But Apple is far more than the sum of the devices that it sells, impressive though they are.
但是,蘋果不僅僅是它銷售的產品的總和,雖然這些產品都讓人們愛不釋手。
Its secret sauce lies in the integration of these with software and services such as its iTunes online content store and its recently announced iCloud online-storage offering.
它的秘訣在于通過軟件和服務將這些設備集中為一體。例如它的itunes在線資料庫和最近提供的icloud在線儲備庫。
These form what tech types like to call an “ecosystem” that has proved so popular that it is forcing other companies to develop similar capabilities.
這種類型的科技被稱為“生態系統”,它是如此受歡迎,以至于迫使其他公司紛紛效仿。
Google, which has long excelled at developing software, recently splashed out $12.5 billion for Motorola Mobility so that it could get its hands on the firm's smartphones, tablets and other devices.
谷歌一直擅長于開發軟件,最近向摩托諾拉移動公司注資125億美元以將該公司的智能手機、平板電腦和其他設備弄到手。
And Amazon, which has a huge cloud business, is planning to launch its own tablet computer to compete with Apple's iPad.
有著巨大云業務的亞馬遜公司也在計劃推出自己的平板電腦與蘋果的ipad競爭。
The good news for Apple's investors is that the firm has been given a great head start in the battle for dominance of this emerging tech landscape thanks to Mr Jobs, whose vision of the future has been honed over a long and tumultuous career.
對于蘋果的投資者們來說,好消息是,多虧了喬布斯,蘋果公司在搶奪科技領域領導地位的競爭中占據非常有利的地位。
After co-founding Apple with Steve Wozniak in the 1970s, he went on to pioneer the era of the personal computer in the following decade. He was then ousted from Apple after a boardroom coup in 1985.
喬布斯對未來的遠見在長期而豐富的職業生涯中經過了歷練。20世紀70年代,在與史蒂夫沃茲尼亞克共同創辦了蘋果公司后的十年里,喬布斯開創了個人電腦的時代。然后在1985年的一次蘋果董事會政變中被驅逐出蘋果公司。
After that, Mr Jobs followed his heart and his intuition by building up Pixar, a film studio that specialises in computer-animated films. It has produced a string of hits, from “Toy Story” to “Finding Nemo”.
在那之后,喬布斯跟隨了自己的內心和直覺創辦了皮克斯電影工作室,它專門從事電腦動畫電影,并制作了一連串的好作品,如“玩具總動員”和“海底總動員”
He returned to Apple as an adviser in 1996, when the firm was in dire straits.
1996年,在蘋果陷入重大困境之際,他作為顧問重返公司。
A year later he was made interim chief executive.
一年后,他成為臨時執行總裁。
Asked at the time what he thought Mr Jobs should do with Apple, Michael Dell, a rival computer-maker, helpfully suggested that he should shut it down.
當競爭對手—電腦制造商邁克爾戴爾被問到,他認為喬布斯應如何對待蘋果的時候,戴爾好心建議他應該將蘋果公司關閉。
Find out how much of an Apple iPhone is actually a Samsung with our "teardown" infographic.Mr Jobs ignored that advice.Instead he led the company on to its greatest triumphs. Among them were the creation of the iMac, which revived the firm's ailing computer business, and the development of the iPod, which ended up transforming the music industry. But just as important as what Apple did was what it did not do.
喬布斯沒有接受這個建議。相反,他將公司帶入了全盛時期。在此期間,蘋果生產了imac,使破敗的電腦業務煥發了生機。同時,也研發了ipod,結束了音樂工業的轉換。蘋果做了什么,這很重要,但是,蘋果沒有做什么,一樣重要。
Charles Golvin of Forrester, a research firm, says that one of Mr Jobs's greatest skills has been to decide which projects the firm should not undertake.
弗雷斯特研究公司的查爾斯戈爾文說喬布斯的計策之一便是決定哪些項目公司不應該去做。
It has been widely rumoured, for example, that engineers at Apple were urging its boss to create a tablet computer in the early part of the decade.
例如,有件事情廣為流傳,蘋果的工程師們曾在十年間的早期建議他們的老板生產一臺平板電腦。
But Mr Jobs turned a deaf ear to their entreaties and instead insisted that the company focus on producing a smartphone.
但是喬布斯沒有接受他們的懇求,而是堅持使公司致力于生產一款智能手機。
The result was the iPhone, which transformed yet another market and is still minting money.
結果便是iphone的問世,它改變了另一個市場并依然在賺錢。
In a creative cauldron like Apple, ideas are rarely in short supply.
在像蘋果這樣一家具有創造力的大公司里,從不缺乏建議。
But the skill of choosing the right ones to focus on at the right time is rare.
但是采納正確的建議并在正確的時間實施,這種能力確是不多見的。
Mr Jobs has it. Apple's shareholders will have to hope that Mr Cook does too.
而喬布斯就有這種能力。蘋果的股東們應該期待庫克也有這種能力。