FreeRange user yuebai li wanted you to see this:
"拯救索尼:游戏开始"
Face value
Game on
游戏开始了
Mar 5th 2009
From The Economist print edition
Sir Howard Stringer believes he is finally in a position to fix Sony
霍华德.斯金格相信他最终处于拯救索尼的高度之上
WHEN Akio Morita, Sony’s co-founder, gave the firm its name in the 1950s, he was afraid it could be mispronounced in Japanese as “son-en”, which means “to lose yen”. Little could he have imagined the problems that his eventual successor, Sir Howard Stringer, would face. The company that long dominated the field of consumer electronics, from the first pocket transistor radio to the Walkman and the PlayStation, is in trouble. Almost every product line is unprofitable. Sony expects to lose ¥260 billion (nearly $3 billion) when it reports its 2008 results, its first loss in 14 years. “What this recession has done is expose the weaknesses in our system that we didn’t want really to admit,” says Sir Howard in his sunny 20th-floor office overlooking Tokyo.
二十世纪五十年代,当索尼公司的缔造者盛田昭夫给这个公司取名的时候,他担心这个名字会被错误地发成“损円”,在日语中的意思是“失去日圆”。他没有想到这个问题最终会直面他的继任者——霍华德.斯金格。这个公司已经很长时间控制了消费者电子产品的领域,从第一个便携式晶体管收音机到随身听到PlayStation,但是现在已身陷困境。几乎每一个产品线都是亏损的。2008年的财务报告上,索尼公司预计会损失2600亿日圆(相当于30亿美元),14年来第一个损失。“这次衰退暴露了存在于我们的系统中我们不愿意承认的薄弱环节。”霍华德站在他的阳光充足、可以俯视整个东京的20层楼办公室,做如是说。
But the crisis is finally enabling him to shake things up at Sony, something he has been trying to do since his arrival as chairman and chief executive in 2005. In recent days Sir Howard has gently eased out the company’s president, Ryoji Chubachi, who was installed just before Sir Howard’s own appointment, and who has stymied his restructuring efforts. Sir Howard has also appointed four young, loyal lieutenants—whom he dubs “the Four Musketeers”—to lead Sony’s newly reorganised business units, further tightening his grip on the company.
但是危机最终赋予他权力重振索尼,而这也是他自从担任公司董事长兼首席执行官的职务以来一直在尽力尝试的事。在最近几年,霍华德以不伤和气的方式免除公司董事中钵良治的职务。在这之前,中钵良治担任过霍华德的职务,他可能阻碍霍华德重组的计划。霍华德也委任了四位年轻、忠诚的副手,他亲切得称他们为四个火枪手,领导索尼重组的商业部门,更加紧密地团结公司上下员工进一步稳定自己对公司的控制。
This being Japan, where even sudden change happens slowly, the reforms will not take effect until April 1st. But the overhaul is long overdue. Sony’s music-player business has been crushed by Apple’s iPod and iPhone, and its mobile-phone unit, Sony Ericsson, has suffered as the handset market has polarised between cheap models and advanced “smart” phones. Sony is the world’s second-largest LCD television-maker, but for five years has made a loss on every set it has sold. Its video-game division, which used to dominate the field and sustain the rest of the company, is expected to make a loss in 2008. (Sony’s rival Nintendo, by contrast, the maker of the Wii console that has far outsold Sony’s expensive PlayStation 3, is expected to make a profit of ¥530 billion.)
在日本,甚至是突然的改变也会慢慢发生,他的改革措施直到4月1号才能生效。但是对索尼的大检修还是过期太久对公司的全面修整为时已晚。索尼的音乐播放器生意已经被苹果公司的ipod和iphone挤垮;移动手机部门,索尼爱立信,已经蒙受损失,因为话机市场已经分化为两级,或者是简单价格低廉类型的,或者是先进的智能手机。索尼公司是世界第二大的液晶电视生产商,但是五年来一直遭受损失每一个销售的机型都会导致损失。它的视频游戏部门原来在这个领域占支配地位并能帮助维持公司其他部门,但是在2008年可能开始亏损。(相反,索尼的竞争对手任天堂,Wii的制造商,其销售额已经比索尼昂贵的PS3高出很多,预期销售额可达5300亿圆。)
Sir Howard has encountered strong internal resistance in his efforts to turn Sony around, but he cannot escape blame for its woes. He acknowledges that he failed to press for bigger changes at the outset, while he sought allies. And he sent the wrong signals early on: in his first three years, Sir Howard spent only half of each month in Tokyo, and stayed at a hotel rather than a permanent residence. “The core of Sony’s problem is in Japan, but Sir Howard is not,” complained his critics. He now says he will spend three weeks of each month at the headquarters in Tokyo.
霍华德在重组索尼的过程中遇到强烈的内部阻力,但是对于它的困境,他始终难辞其咎。他承认在一方面寻求联盟的同时,并没有从一开始就努力寻求更大规模的变革。他很早就发出错误的讯号:在他管辖下的前三年,霍华德每个月只花了一半的时间在东京,是住在旅馆而不是固定的宅邸。“索尼公司的核心问题在日本,而霍华德却不在。”评论家们这么抱怨。他说他现在开始每个月会在东京总部呆三个星期时间。
Affable and unguarded, Sir Howard does not fit the stereotype of a Western corporate boss, let alone a Japanese one. Born in Cardiff, Wales, he squeezed into steerage aboard the SS United States in 1965, at the age of 22, and arrived in New York for “some excitement” with just a Green Card (residency permit) and $200. After working for a few months as a clerk at CBS, a big broadcaster, he was drafted to serve in Vietnam by dint of that Green Card. (“I hadn’t been in America long enough to die for it,” he joked to his comrades, who took the oddly accented fellow under their wing.) He was shot at, earned a medal and returned to CBS.
谦逊有礼和没有防备意识的霍华德不符合西方公司老板的标准,更别提一个日本公司。1965年,他22岁的时候,登上SS United States号,挤入座舱,为了追求“刺激”他来到纽约,身上只有一张绿卡(暂住证)和200美元。在CBS(一个有名的广播公司)当了几个月小职员之后,他被调到越南,由于绿卡的关系。(“我还没有在美国呆到足够长的时间以至于为它去死。”他这样跟他的同伴开玩笑,后者则将这个发音古怪的家伙置于自己的保护之下)让他感到震惊的是,他中了一枪,赢得了一块奖牌并回到了CBS总部。
As a news producer he won ten individual Emmy Awards, and eventually rose finally of the network itself in 1988 to become president of CBS News, and finally of the network itself in 1988 (becoming an American citizen to comply with federal broadcasting laws). Sir Howard left CBS in 1995 to run a video-on-demand company, Tele-TV, that was backed by big American telecoms companies but was ahead of its time. He joined Sony in 1997 and quickly rose to run its American operations. He received his knighthood in 1999.
作为一个新闻制作人他赢得了十次个人埃米奖,并最终在CBS新闻部担任总经理要职,最终在1988年把自己网络化(成为一个美国居民,遵循联邦广播法律)。1995年霍华德离开了CBS经营了一家视频点播公司,Tele-TV,并获得了大的美国电信公司的支持。但这一方式为时过早。1997年他加入索尼公司,很快管理它在美国的分公司。他在1999年受封为爵士。
Sir Howard became Sony’s chief executive in June 2005 after the company had made a series of stumbles. Foreigners are often used to shake things up in Japan, where a Japanese boss might be too cautious, deferential and slow. Sir Howard tried to revamp Sony as best he could, shutting vanity projects that lacked a market, including a unit that produced a robotic dog. But he was never given the remit to make really radical changes—unlike Carlos Ghosn, the Brazilian boss who saved Nissan from bankruptcy.
2005年6月,在公司发生了一系列变动之后,霍华德正式成为索尼公司的首席执行官。在日本,外国人一般被用来整顿事物并使之重振旗鼓,而日本老板则可能过分谨慎,不能大刀阔斧的改革。霍华德为了使索尼为之一新已经尽其所能,停止了缺少市场的空洞项目,包括制造机器狗的一个单位。但是他始终没有被允许作一些根本的改变——不是像卡洛斯,这个巴西老板从破产边缘拯救了尼桑。
Crisis and opportunity
危机与机遇
Now Sir Howard has the control he feels he needs. “When this crisis came along, for me it was a godsend, because I could reorganise the company without having to battle the forces of the status quo,” he says. He has reorganised Sony into two groups, one based around networked media products (games, computers, music-players, new mobile products and related services) and the other encompassing televisions, cameras and components. Crucially, the restructuring means that software development and procurement will be wrested from individual product groups and centralised, quashing their “silo” mentality—something Sir Howard has long been trying to accomplish.
目前他已经获得了自己需要的控制权。“危机来临对我来是说是一个好机会,因为我可以重组公司不用和保守派进行较量。”他说。他把索尼公司重组成两个组别,一组致力于以网络为依托的电子产品(游戏,计算机,音乐播放器,新的移动产品和相关服务),另一组围绕电视机,相机及其元件。至为关键的是,重组意味着从个体产品小组手中收回并集中化软件的开发和征购任务,清除他们单兵作战的精神状态。他希望完成这一任务由来已久。
The reforms go deeper. Sony will cut around 16,000 employees, including full-time workers who had counted on lifetime employment. It also will close up to six of its 57 factories around the world. Sony expects all this to save around $2.5 billion a year. It has been too slow to move its operations to where its customers are. Around half of its products by value are made in Japan, but only 15% of its electronics sales are domestic. The strength of the yen, which soared during 2008, is debilitating.
随着改革的逐渐深入,索尼会裁员16000名员工,其中包括指望着终生雇佣的全职工作者。它还会关闭57个分布在世界各地的工厂。索尼公司希望这样能够每年节省25亿左右的开支。在把公司的运作转移到顾客所在的地方的过程中索尼步子太慢。索尼的50%的产品(通过产值来计算)在日本制造,但只有15%的销售在日本完成。日圆在2008年升值,它的竞争力正在衰弱。
Sir Howard says Sony is open to making deals to bring in new ideas and technologies or to shed underperforming businesses. “The issue of cutting costs, laying off people and closing factories, and the like, is very difficult,” he says. “I’ve got to respect the country that I’m in—but I will push them as far as I can.” The big question now, assuming that Sir Howard is finally in a position to make radical changes, is whether he will be able to make them quickly enough to save Sony, and himself. The next year will be his final toss of the dice. If he is unable to overhaul the company, the next head to roll will be his.
他说索尼公司愿意达成交易以引入新的见解和技术,并削减绩效不佳的经营业务。“降低成本、削减员工、关闭工厂等一些列举措实施起来并不容易。我得尊重我所在的这个国家,不过我还是要把改革更深层次的推广下去。”既然他最终得到了这个他可以借以实现剧变的位置,现在的问题是他的行动是否足够迅速以拯救索尼和他自己。明年将是他的最后机会。如果他不能重整公司,那下一个滚蛋的就是他自己。
随机文章:
土耳其和伊朗:越过道德的边境 2007-12-24
阿根廷总统大选:克里斯蒂纳,熟悉的陌生人 2007-11-05
人口统计学:如何应对人口萎缩? 2007-08-04
[2007.04.21]Exchange-traded funds 2007-04-24
[2007.04.19]Weather patterns-How to forecast the forecasters 2007-04-24
收藏到:Del.icio.us
《城客》:第一本中文互动杂志!
经济学人
FreeRange WebReader - bringing the Internet to your mobile phone like never before!
Reading this on your Windows Smartphone, Palm or Blackberry? Try it now by clicking http://mwap.at
Posted via email from liyuebai's posterous