蘋果真的會收購Beats嗎
|
????蘋果公司（Apple）真的會像《金融時報》（Financial Times）上周四晚間報道的那樣，以32億美元的價格收購Beats電子公司（Beats Electronics）嗎？ ????科技博客聚合網（Techmeme）的報道似乎是這樣認為的。 ????截至上周五上午，70多家媒體紛紛節選、放大了這則未經證實的報道稱，音樂制作人吉米?艾歐文和嘻哈明星Dr Dre聯合創辦的耳機制造商和流音樂流服務公司Beats有望成為蘋果公司歷史上最大的收購對象。 ????《連線》雜志（Wired）把它稱為蘋果“自iPad以來的最佳創意”。 ????但投行派杰公司（Piper Jaffray）的吉恩?蒙斯特對此持懷疑態度。 ????“我們很難看出這筆收購背后的合理性，”他在上周四晚間給客戶的文件中表示。“當然，Beats將把世界一流的音樂品牌帶入蘋果，但是蘋果早已擁有一流的品牌，而且從未為了品牌而收購品牌（例如，蘋果旗下沒有非蘋果子品牌）。另外，Beats的知識產權是否會給這筆收購帶來比品牌更能站得住腳的理由，我們也還不得而知。” |
????Is Apple (AAPL) really going to buy Beats Electronics for $3.2 billion, as reported Thursday evening by theFinancial Times? ????The main body of the tech press seems to think so. ????By Friday morning, more than70 publications had picked up and amplified the unconfirmed report that the largest acquisition in Apple's history might be the headphone maker and music-streaming service founded by music producer Jimmy Iovine and hip-hop star Dr Dre. ????Wired called it Apple's "Best Idea Since the iPad." ????Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster, for one, is skeptical. ????"We are struggling to see the rationale behind this move," he wrote in a note to clients Thursday evening. "Beats would of course bring a world class brand in music to Apple, but Apple already has a world class brand and has never acquired a brand for a brand's sake (i.e., there are no non-Apple sub-brands under the company umbrella). Separately, we are not aware of any intellectual property within Beats that would drive the acquisition justification beyond the brand." |
|
????雖然蒙斯特的觀點僅代表少數意見，但是并不是只有他一個人這么認為。 ????“希望這不是真的，”蘋果信息博客 《MacObserver》的布賴恩?沙芬寫道，他發牢騷說Beats的耳機“只會產生大量的噪音干擾，會把任何音樂變得混亂不堪。” ????雖然筆者目前沒有內部消息，甚至不清楚Beats音樂訂閱者的數量，筆者同意《時代》雜志（Time）作家哈里?麥克恩的觀點。截至上周日，他用七種方式仔細研究了這次收購，還在文章末尾處發出了終極警告： ????或者，這件事根本不會成為現實。如果果真如此，請忘記這篇文章，這樣我才能再撰文解釋這種計劃的荒謬和根本不值得考慮的原因。 ????最新消息1：在一篇巧妙命名為Beats Me的博文中，美國宏橋信托投資集團（BTIG）的沃爾特?皮斯基客觀地看待這個傳聞中的交易： ????過去幾十年來，蘋果收購案金額從未超過4億美元，而此次價格達30億美元的收購，打破了原有的收購模式。收購案公布后，必定會產生需要由管理層甚至是董事會解決的問題。讓我來稍微緩和一下這種夸張的措辭。30億美元尚不足蘋果現金的2%，也不足年自由現金流量的10%。所以，從長遠角度來看，這筆收購不會給蘋果的業績帶來重大影響，但是收購模式的改變是問題產生的原因所在。 ????最新消息2：市場調研公司Forrester分析師詹姆斯?麥奎維給出了另一種觀點： ????鑒于蘋果歷來對自己龐大的知識產權寶庫所持的態度異常謹慎，如果蘋果放棄收購計劃，特別是在昨晚的“試探氣球”（如果確實如此）結果如此糟糕的情況下，那也是意料之中的事。但是讓我們來考慮這樣一個事實：蘋果不是一家愚蠢的公司。誠然，蘋果可以出錯（例如，Apple Ping），但是即使摔倒，它也通常是摔倒在值得攀登的高峰的半路上。由此，我得出了下面這個幻想：如果在收購Beats的過程中，蘋果知道和掌握我們所不了解的情況，結果會怎樣呢？果真如此，蘋果會怎么做？（他按照所謂的“合理性降序排列、轟動性性升序排列”，給出了三種可能。）請參閱《相信蘋果》（Having Faith in Apple）。（財富中文網） ????譯者：喬樹靜/汪皓 |
????Munster's is a minority opinion, but he's not entirely on his own. ????"Please let it be false," wrote The MacObserver's Bryan Chaffin, who complains that Beats headphones "can turn any music into a muddy romp through a swampy bottom land of mush." ????Having no inside knowledge whatsoever -- not even the number of Beats Music subscribers -- I'm with Time's Harry McCracken. After examining the deal seven ways to Sunday, he ends his piece with the ultimate caveat: ????Or maybe this isn't happening at all. If it doesn't, kindly forget that I wrote this story, so that I can write another one explaining why the notion was absurd and unworthy of contemplation in the first place. ????UPDATE 1: In a blog post cleverly titled Beats Me, BTIG's Walter Piecyk puts the rumored deal in perspective: ????A $3 billion purchase by Apple following decades of acquisitions that haven't topped $400 million is a change in pattern that will justifiably generate some questions for management and perhaps the Board of Directors to address if announced. Let me tone down that hyperbole a bit. $3 billion is less than 2% of the company's cash and less than 10% its annual free cash flow. So in the grand scheme of things, it's not a deal that is going to have a material impact on results but the change in pattern is what drives the questions. ????UPDATE 2: Another perspective, this one from Forrester's James McQuivey: ????Given Apple's historical tight-fistedness with the contents of its huge treasure chest, it wouldn't be surprising if the company backed away, especially after last night's trial balloon (if it was such) sputtered so badly. But let's consider this fact: Apple is not a stupid company. Sure, Apple can make mistakes (Apple Ping, anyone?) but when it trips over itself, it usually does so on the way up a hill worth climbing. Which leads me to this flight of fancy: What if, in buying Beats, Apple knows something that we do not, Apple sees something that we do not? If true, what could it be? [He goes on to offer three possibilities, in what he calls "descending order of plausibility, but ascending order of awesomeness."] See Having Faith in Apple. |
最新文章