Electric shock of the new—How to be the next Tesla

A traffic jam of upstarts is vying to follow in Elon Musk’s tyre tracks. Does any stand a chance??

（接上一部分）

The basic blueprint for survival?involves three?elements. The?upstarts must first find a starting niche from which they can expand.?They then need actually to produce cars at scale.?Finally,?they have to create a sales-and-distribution network. Most will fail at one or more of these steps.?Ironically,?those with the best odds of?emulating Tesla's success may be the ones that look least like it.

the best odds of?：最有勝算的

emulate v. ??/?emjule?t/ 1.努力趕上；同…競爭 ?She hopes to emulate her sister's sporting achievements. 她希望在運動成績方面趕上她姐姐。2.(computing 計) (計算機程序等) 仿真；模仿

Start with picking?your?battlefield.?That could be geographic.?Philippe Houchois of?Jefferies,?another?investment bank, reckons that the next Tesla will come from China.?Consumers hungry for new tech and?a government keen to support electrification have given China's insurgents a head-start.?Nio, the?largest of the?lot, made?44,ooo cars in?2o2o.?It is valued at?$69bn.?The market capitalisations of Xpeng and Li, respectively?$28bn and $22bn,?are also juicy.?Rich access to capital helps fund expansion at home?and abroad.?Xpeng has already started selling cars in Norway, home to Europe's most?enthusiastic EV buyers.?Nio is about to join it.

a head-start：有利開端，先行一步的優(yōu)勢

Even more important than geography is choosing the right market segment. Tesla was not the first to make EVs but it was the first to make big and pricey premium ones where the high cost of the battery could be absorbed.?Many new firms are also aiming at premium SUVs and?saloons?where profit margins are fattest.?But competition is hotting up from established carmakers such as Volkswagen's Audi and Porsche brands,?as well?as Mercedes.?In April Geely,?a Chinese firm with global?ambitions,?launched a premium electric marque called?Zeekr. The mass market, meanwhile,?is likewise busy, with GM and Ford the latest to announce a big electric push.

SUV：abbr. 越野車（sport-utility vehicles）? ?hot?up?：加劇，變熱

Saloon??n. /s??lu?n/1.小轎車；（三廂）四門轎車??a five-seater family saloon 五座家庭式轎車；2.（舊時美國西部和加拿大的）酒吧，酒館；3.（客輪上的）交誼廳

Volkswagen/?vo?ksw?ɡ?n/?大眾汽車? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ??Porsche /p???/ 保時捷

Mercedes?/m?'s?di:z/ 奔馳汽車? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ??Geely：吉利汽車

Other segments may therefore be a better bet. One is light commercial vehicles, demand for which has been boosted by the pandemice-commerce boom. Alastair Hayfield of Interact Analysis, a consultancy, ?sees "no Tesla yet" for delivery vans. Carmakers are merely popping EV power trains into existing products—an unhappy compromise that affects performance. That leaves opportunities for firms like Arrival and Rivian. Another potentially lucrative niche?is the hypercar. Wealthy petrol-heads seem willing to?fork out?$2m or so to add to their stables. Rimac and Pininfarina of Italy also see these cars as test-beds?for EV technology to sell to other car firms. China's Silk-FAW?considers its Hongqi S9 hybrid as a gateway to the mass market.

lucrative ?adj. ??/?lu?kr?t?v/賺大錢的；獲利多的 ? a lucrative business/contract/market 利潤豐厚的生意╱合同╱市場

fork out (為某事物) 大把掏錢 ?Visitors to the castle had to fork out for a guidebook. 參觀城堡的游客得為一本旅游指南掏很多錢。

test-bed：試驗臺

Silk-FAW：一汽集團與美國SilkEV合資成立的Silk-FAW；FAW一汽集團

Identifying the right segment may not be enough,?however.?Brian Gu,?president of Xpeng,?admits that the new firms must offer something truly different. For years the industry's technologically?stodgier incumbents?"didn't realise it was?a tech race",?says Peter Rawlinson,?who runs Lucid.?As cars become more?like personal electronic devices,?being tech firms first and carmakers second may confer?an advantage.?Foxconn's boss,?Young Liu, has argued that the driving experience of the future will be?"software-driven and software-defined".

stodgy adj. /?st?d?i/1.吃下去感覺撐的；易飽的；2.滯澀的；古板的；枯燥無味的

incumbent /?n?k?mb?nt/在職者；現(xiàn)任者?the present incumbent of the White House 現(xiàn)任美國總統(tǒng)

Confer??v./k?n?f??(r)/ ?1.~ (with sb) (on/about sth) 商討；協(xié)商；交換意見??He wanted to confer with his colleagues before reaching a decision. 他想與他的同事先商議一下再作出決定。 2. ~ sth (on/upon sb) 授予（獎項、學位、榮譽或權利）?An honorary degree was conferred on him by Oxford University in 2001. 牛津大學于 2001 年授予他榮譽學位。?

譯文

The?basic?blueprint?for survival?involves three?elements. The?upstarts must first find a starting niche from which they can expand.?They then need actually to produce cars at scale.?Finally,?they have to create a sales-and-distribution network. Most will fail at one or more of these steps.?Ironically,?those with the best odds of?emulating Tesla's success may be the ones that look least like it.

車企求生存最基礎的行動方案需要包括三個要素。新貴們首先需要在他們可以擴張的地方找到盈利點；其次，規(guī)模生產汽車；最后，需要建立銷售和分銷網(wǎng)絡。大多數(shù)會在其中一個或者多個步驟失敗。諷刺的是，最可能成為下一個特斯拉的可能是最不像特斯拉的企業(yè)。

Start with picking?your?battlefield.?That could be geographic.?Philippe Houchois of?Jefferies,?another?investment bank, reckons that the next Tesla will come from China.?Consumers hungry for new tech and?a government keen to support electrification have given China's insurgents?a head-start.?Nio, the?largest of the?lot, made?44,ooo cars in?2o2o.?It is valued at?$69bn.?The market capitalisations of Xpeng and Li, respectively?$28bn and $22bn,?are also juicy.?Rich access to capital helps fund expansion at home?and abroad.?Xpeng has already started selling cars in Norway, home to Europe's most?enthusiastic EV buyers.?Nio is about to join it.

從選擇戰(zhàn)場開始。這可能是地理上的。另一家投資銀行杰富瑞(Jefferies)的菲利普?霍喬斯(Philippe Houchois)認為，下一個特斯拉將來自中國。消費者對新科技的渴望、政府熱衷支持電氣化讓中國的汽車行業(yè)挑戰(zhàn)者們擁有先發(fā)優(yōu)勢。蔚來汽車，其中最大，2020年生產了44000輛車。它的估值是690億美元。小鵬汽車和理想汽車的市場價值分別是280億和220億美元，也非常可觀。多樣的資本渠道幫助企業(yè)進行海內外擴張。小鵬汽車已經開始在挪威銷售汽車，挪威有歐洲電動汽車最狂熱的買家。蔚來汽車也打算加入其中。

Even more important than geography is choosing the right market segment. Tesla was not the first to make EVs but it was the first to make big and pricey premium ones where the high cost of the battery could be absorbed.?Many new firms are also aiming at premium?SUVs and?saloons?where profit margins are fattest.?But competition?is hotting up from?established carmakers such as Volkswagen's Audi and Porsche brands,?as well?as Mercedes.?In April Geely,?a Chinese firm with global?ambitions,?launched a premium electric marque called?Zeekr. The mass market, meanwhile,?is likewise busy, with GM and Ford the latest to announce a big electric push.

比地理要素更重要的是選擇正確的市場范圍。特斯拉不是第一家開始做電動汽車的，但確是第一家做大、且有高價優(yōu)勢負擔蓄電池的高成本。很多新公司也瞄準高端商務車和轎車這些利潤肥美的地方。但與老牌汽車企業(yè)例如大眾、保時捷以及奔馳等競爭升級。今年4月，一家有全球野心的中國車企—吉利，發(fā)布了一款高端電動品牌汽車，叫做Zeekr。與此同時，大眾市場同樣繁忙，通用汽車和福特最新宣布了一項大型的電力項目。

Other segments may therefore be a better bet. One is light commercial vehicles, demand for which has been boosted by the pandemice-commerce boom. Alastair Hayfield of Interact Analysis, a consultancy, ?sees "no Tesla yet" for delivery vans. Carmakers are merely?popping?EV power trains into existing products—an unhappy compromise that affects performance. That leaves opportunities for firms like Arrival and Rivian. Another potentially?lucrative niche?is the hypercar. Wealthy petrol-heads seem willing to?fork out?$2m or so to add to their stables. Rimac and Pininfarina of Italy also see these cars as?test-beds?for EV technology to sell to other car firms. China's?Silk-FAW?considers its Hongqi S9 hybrid as a gateway to the mass market.

因此，其他細分市場可能是更好的選擇。其中之一是輕型商用車，疫情期間，電子商務的繁榮推動了對輕型商用車的需求。咨詢公司互動分析(Interact Analysis)的納爾斯泰爾?海菲爾德(Alastair Hayfield)認為，送貨貨車領域“還沒有特斯拉”。汽車制造商只是在現(xiàn)有汽車產品中加入電動汽車動力系統(tǒng)——這是一個影響性能的令人不快的妥協(xié)。這給像Arrival和Rivian這樣的公司留下了機會。另一個豐厚的利潤點是超級汽車。富有的汽油愛好者們似乎愿意支付200萬美元左右來增加他們的車庫。意大利的Rimac和Pininfarina也將這些汽車視為賣給其他車場電動技術的試驗臺。中國的Silk-FAW將其紅旗S9混合動力超跑視為進入大眾市場的門戶。

Identifying the right segment may not be enough,?however.?Brian Gu,?president of Xpeng,?admits that the new firms must offer something truly different. For years the industry's technologically?stodgier incumbents?"didn't realise it was?a tech race",?says Peter Rawlinson,?who runs Lucid.?As cars become more?like personal electronic devices,?being tech firms first and carmakers second may?confer?an advantage.?Foxconn's boss,?Young Liu, has argued that the driving experience of the future will be?"software-driven and software-defined".

確認正確的市場范圍有可能還不夠，小鵬汽車的董事長顧宏地(Hongdi Brian Gu)承認新興企業(yè)必須有一些不一樣的賣點。Lucid掌門人Peter Rawlinson表示：多年以來，汽車行業(yè)古板的當權者并沒有意識到汽車行業(yè)的競爭是科技上的競爭。隨著汽車變得越來越像消費者的個人電子設備，先是科技企業(yè)之后進入汽車制造業(yè)似乎更有優(yōu)勢。富士康的老板劉勇（young liu 音譯）認為未來駕駛體驗由軟件定義和驅動。?