旧文共享：“别说你是中国公司”：Lenovo是如何成为国际品牌的

这是2014年发表在达沃斯经济论坛上的文章。文章是人肉翻译，虽然尽力展现文章原意，但难免有语法不顺甚或词不达意之处，所以采用了先贴英文原文，再放翻译的模式，便于读者相互对照。

原文网址：http://projourno.org/2014/04/dont-say-youre-a-chinese-company-how-lenovo-grew-as-a-global-brand/

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Don’t Say You’re a Chinese Company: How Lenovo Grew as a Global Brand

“别说你是中国公司”：Lenovo是如何成为国际品牌的

At the end of January, Chinese technology company Lenovo acquired cellphone maker Motorola Mobility from Google for $2.91 billion (U.S.). Two years after Google itself had bought Motorola, Lenovo’s move has made the company the world’s third biggest smartphone maker, just behind Samsung and Apple. Already the largest PC company in the world since July 2013, Lenovo is on its way to achieving its goal of becoming the No. 1 company in smart-connected devices: Today it reaches about 45 percent of the world’s population with its cellphones and sells more smartphones and tablets than PCs. With operations in more than 60 countries and sales in about 160 nations, Lenovo has become a multinational company. Now, as with many Chinese companies, its challenge is to become an international brand.

一月末，中国科技公司Lenovo从Google手里以29.1亿美元的价格收购了手机制造商摩托罗拉移动。在Google收购摩托罗拉仅仅两年之后，Lenovo的动作一举让自己在苹果和三星之后成为了世界第三大手机制造商。在2013年7月Levono成为世界第一大个人电脑公司之后，Lenovo正在成为智能硬件业的世界第一：世界上将近45%的人口都在使用它的手机，而且它卖出的手机和平板比个人电脑还要多。拥有遍及超过60个国家的业务以及打入了160个市场的产品，Lenovo是当之无愧的国际公司。现在，和许多其他的中国公司一样，它面临的挑战是如何成为一个国际品牌。

And for Lenovo this means not being Chinese, as much as possible. “We don’t go anywhere with the idea that we are a Chinese company, but more that we are a global company,” says Brion Tingler, Lenovo’s director of global media relations.

而对于联想来说，这意味着离中国越远越好。“我们在任何地方都不会宣称自己是中国公司，我们是全球性的公司。”Lenovo的全球媒体关系总监Brion Tingler说。

Lenovo doesn’t like to think of itself as a Chinese company, and it strives to avoid appearing like one. The name Lenovodoes not sound Chinese but comes from the words legend and novo (Latin for new). And the policy goes beyond marketing. As the company has tried to become recognized as a brand on a global scale, it endeavors to make it difficult to say where it’s come from.

Lenovo并不热衷于将自己看成一家中国公司，并且它尽力让自己看上去不像一家中国公司。它的名字Lenovo听上去就不像中文而是来自于英文'Legand(传奇)'和拉丁文'novo(新)'。这一政策延伸到了市场宣传之外，它努力让自己的来处模糊不清。

“When you look at the management team, out of the top 10 people at the company, including the CEO, there are six different nationalities,” Tingler says. “We call it the global-local model. In different places around the world, the people that run the markets we are in are from those markets. So Brazilians run Brazil, Europeans run Europe, Indians run India.”

“如果你看看我们的管理团队，公司最高层的10个人，包括CEO，来自于六个不同的国家，”Tingler说。“我们叫它‘全球-本地’模式。在世界不同的地方，我们总是找当地人来运作当地的市场。所以巴西人运作巴西市场，欧洲人运作欧洲市场，印度人运作印度市场。”

Nor is Lenovo’s leadership based largely in China. Listed in Hong Kong, the company has top executives not only in that location and Beijing but also in Raleigh, N.C., while other senior executives are in Singapore, Tokyo and California’s Silicon Valley.

Lenovo的大部分领导层也并不是基于中国。它在香港上市，并且在香港、北京和北卡罗来纳的Raleigh都有高管，其他的高级管理层则分布在新加坡、东京和加州的硅谷。

The result is that there’s very little to identify Lenovo as a Chinese company. And though a pioneer, Lenovo is not alone in this: The construction of its brand and its obscuring of its Chinese origins sheds light on the practices and challenges of many Chinese companies now looking for name recognition that is equal to their business success.

这样做的结果就是只有通过蛛丝马迹才能认定Lenovo是一家中国公司。尽管联想在这方面是先锋，但它绝不孤单。它在塑造品牌的同时尽力掩饰自己的中国血统揭示了中国公司在塑造和商业成功相称的名誉时面临的挑战。

“By saying that they are a global company, [Lenovo] says they are as good as anybody else, not only just as good as anybody else in China,” says James Roy of the China Market Research Group in Shanghai. This is smart on Lenovo’s part, since Chinese brands still do not have a lot of prestige internationally, or even within China. “Chinese consumers want to feel they are buying the best there is to offer in the world,” says Tingler, which means they tend to prefer foreign brands to Chinese brands. In fact, in several parts of China, Lenovo markets itself as a global brand, or at least not as a Chinese brand.

“Lenovo通过宣称自己是全球性企业试图说明它并不只在中国是优秀的，在国际舞台上同样优秀。”位于上海的中国市场调查额James Roy说。对于Lenovo来说这是很聪明的举动。中国品牌在国际上，有的甚至在本国内地位都并不高。“中国的消费者希望自己购买的是世界上最好的产品。”Tingler说。这意味着他们更倾向于购买外国品牌。实际上，Lenovo在中国一些地方仍然宣称自己是全球品牌，或者至少没那么‘中国’。

Lenovo acquired Motorola in spite of the latter’s losses of about $380 million (U.S.) in the fourth quarter of 2013. In part, the deal was made with an eye on Motorola’s patents books. Lenovo is now able to use the company’s 8,000 U.S. patents and 15,000 foreign ones on a permanent, royalty-free basis. But beyond the cellphones and patents, the acquisition reflects Lenovo’s larger strategy of buying up foreign names to grow its international presence faster. After the acquisition of IBM’s ThinkPad in 2005, Lenovo acquired German consumer electronics company Medion in 2011 and Brazilian electronics giant CCE in 2013, among others.

尽管摩托罗拉在2013年第四季度时亏损了3.8亿美元，Lenovo仍然收购了它。一部分的动机是Lenovo觊觎摩托罗拉的专利。Lenovo现在永久拥有摩托罗拉将近8000项美国国内专利以及15000项国际专利。在专利之外，这次收购展示了Lenovo更宏伟的规划，那就是通过收购外国品牌来加速增长国际存在感。在2005年买下了IBM的ThinkPad之后，Lenovo在2011年又收购了德国消费电子公司Medion，以及在2013年收购了巴西电子巨头CCE。

It’s a common practice among Chinese firms. Acquisitions of foreign firms by Chinese companies, flush with cash from their operations in China, have multiplied in other industries as well. In the car industry, for example, British car manufacturer Rover was acquired by BMW, Tata and China’s SAIC in 2005, and Volvo was bought by Chinese automaker Geely in 2010. In 2012, Dalian Wanda took over U.S. movie theater chain AMC Entertainment, and in 2013 Chinese meat producer Shuanghui acquired U.S. pork producer Smithfield.

这对于中国公司来说是家常便饭。在其他产业也不乏拿着从中国运营得到的现金去海外大肆收购的中国公司。以汽车产业为例，英国汽车制造商Rover就在2005年被BMW, Tata和中国的上汽集团联合收购。沃尔沃在2010年被中国汽车制造商吉利收购。2012年，大连万达收购了美国院线AMC Entertainment。2013年，中国肉类加工商双汇收购了美国肉类加工商Smithfield。

“A lot of [Chinese] companies are using [acquisitions] as a way of learning about how international branding goes on,” says Roy. “Acquisition gives you immediate recognition, and you can learn how it all works as you go, the way Lenovo has.”

“许多中国公司通过收购来学习国际品牌运作，”Roy说。“收购能让你迅速被认可，并且你能像Lenovo一样来不断学习这一切是如何运作的。”

Lenovo and ThinkPad are a case in point. “For the first several years internationally, they still had the IBM name on the ThinkPad, even though it wasn’t part of IBM anymore. And then, bit by bit, you saw them coming to it, and now it’s all Lenovo ThinkPad,” Roy says.

Lenovo和ThinkPad是现成的例子。“尽管已经和IBM没有瓜葛了，在刚开始的几年内，ThinkPad仍然有IBM的商标在上面。在那之后，一点接一点，你看到Lenovo的名字逐渐出现，直到现在所有的ThinkPad都是Lenovo了。”Roy说。

One of the reasons Chinese companies find it necessary to rely on established brands is their lack of experience in branding. Because of the size of the Chinese market, Chinese companies have gone after domestic consumers for many years before going international. “Many have gotten very big in China and haven’t had to rely on overseas growth, where there was more intense competition, less growth, less awareness of your brand,” says Roy.

在塑造国际品牌方面缺乏经验是中国公司必须依靠已经成熟的品牌的原因之一。因为中国市场的体量，中国公司在踏出国门之前往往已经在中国市场深耕多年。“有许多公司仅仅依靠中国市场就能发展壮大，他们往往不需要依赖于海外运营收入，而国际市场意味着更多的竞争，更缓慢的增长速度，以及更小的品牌知名度。”Roy说。

Several of these Chinese multinationals often started as anonymous factories subcontracted as suppliers to larger companies, before launching their own brand later. Because these companies began as manufacturers, they knew much more about products than branding. Thus their lack of a strong branding strategy today.

在成为跨国公司之前，这些中国公司往往是给大品牌做代工的无名工厂。因为是制造业起家，他们在生产制造方面经验丰富而在品牌方面却知之甚少。这造成了他们今天缺乏强有力的品牌策略的结局。

A particularly good example of this is Huawei, the Chinese telecommunications company, and its approach (or lack of approach) to marketing. Since Huawei has primarily been a telecommunications equipment company working in the business-to-business sphere, it did not need to develop a strong marketing strategy, as it did not have direct contact with consumers. “Huawei’s chairman doesn’t know if they are a high-end or a low-end brand,” says Roy. For Huawei, it’s been more about “making the product, putting it out there and seeing if people like it or not,” he explains.

华为，这家通讯公司的市场策略（或市场无策略）就是一个相当好的例子。作为一家长期面对商业客户的通讯器材公司，因为并不需要直面消费者，华为并不需要发展出强有力的市场策略。“华为的主席说不清他们到底是高端还是低端。”Roy说。对华为而言，更重要的是"推出自己的产品，然后看看人们喜不喜欢"。他解释道。

By contrast, Lenovo has focused on developing a massive and sophisticated branding strategy, tailoring its marketing to different local markets. After being the leader in enterprise products since 2005 with its ThinkPad, Lenovo is now targeting the U.S. consumer market through more consumer-centric products, such as its Yoga tablet, and making use of celebrity endorsements with actor Ashton Kutcher. Outside of the U.S., Lenovo has used the image of basketball superstar Kobe Bryant to increase its smartphone sales in Asia. And the company has also used advertising and targeted online marketing to increase its sales globally, with the tagline “For those who do.”

与华为相反，Lenovo已经着力于针对不同的市场发展出全面成熟的品牌策略。在2005年收购ThinkPad成为商用设备的领头羊之后，Lenovo正在用比如Yoga平板这种以消费者为重心的产品以及像Ashton Kutcher这样的明星代言将目标对准美国消费者产品市场。在美国之外，Lenovo用篮球巨星科比的形象来刺激在亚洲智能手机的销量。它还利用广告语“For those who do”和有针对性的线上营运来增加全球销量。

Despite its efforts to detach itself from its Chinese origins, Lenovo still finds its international approach has its limits. Although the company markets itself as a “global brand” in China’s larger cities, in smaller cities and the countryside, Lenovo often uses its Chinese name, 联想 (Lianxiang), since many locals cannot read English. Tingler explains that for these cities, “we’re not selling directly as a Chinese brand, but we had to tone down some of the global aspects so people can relate to [the brand] better.” Deliberately rootless in its global presentation of itself, Lenovo is finding it must be careful not to lose its customers at home.

尽管做出了脱离中国血统的不懈努力，Lenovo仍然发现自己的全球方案有自己的局限性。虽然这家公司在中国的大城市里将自己打造成国际品牌，但在稍小一些的城市和乡村那些人们读不懂英文的地方，Lenovo依然用自己的中国名字“联想”。“我们并不直接说我们是中国品牌，但是我们必须把全球性的调子降低来让人们更好地产生亲切感。”尽管在国际舞台上刻意标榜自己的“无根”性，Lenovo仍然需要小心应对以不至于失去家里的客户。

If Chinese brands do in fact get large international recognition, Roy says, they will begin to be seen as more Chinese. “As consumers in other markets get familiar with the brands and products, they take on a lot of associations applied with that country,” he notes.

如果中国品牌能在全球范围内得到广泛任何，Roy说，这些公司将会开始强调自己的中国属性。“随着其他市场的消费者渐渐熟悉这些品牌和产品，他们会渐渐认可制造这些产品的国家。”他说。

But in pursuing a strategy of being from everywhere and nowhere, there’s a big question about whether Chinese brands such as Lenovo can ever hope to have the cultural impact of U.S. brands such as Coca-Cola, which have become an inseparable part of America’s image abroad. Lenovo may well become a household name soon. The question is whether people will know that it’s a Chinese one.

尽管追寻“无处不在”和“无根可寻”的策略，像Lenovo这样的中国品牌能否形成类似于可口可乐这样的美国品牌的文化影响力，依然是一个问号。可口可乐已经与美国文化的海外传播密不可分。Lenovo也许会很快成为一个知名品牌。