iPhone为何八年来一直独占鳌头？

Apple’s iPhone Still Breaks the Rules, Eight Years On
iPhone为何八年来一直独占鳌头？

You will hear some carping, in the coming days, about a lack of revolutionary upgrades in the new iPhone. At its media event in San Francisco on Wednesday, Apple added just a handful of features to its latest smartphones, the 6S and 6S Plus, including a pressure-sensitive screen, better cameras and a new color ― pink, or “Rose Gold,” in Apple’s marketing argot.

接下来的几天，你会听到一些有关新款iPhone手机缺乏革命性改进之类的吹毛求疵。在周三于旧金山举行的产品发布会上，苹果公司(Apple)推出的最新款智能手机6S和6S Plus，只在上一款的基础上增加了少量新功能，包括压力敏感屏幕、更好的摄像头和新外观颜色――粉色，苹果的营销用语称之为“玫瑰金”。

It’s the same kind of carping that happens every year. The iPhone is by far Apple’s most important product ― it is, by most accounts, the single most profitable product on the planet ― and for many analysts, that very significance highlights a vulnerability. So tech observers are once again wondering how much longer Apple can sustain the magic. Has Apple done enough to maintain its outsize lead in the industry? Can the iPhone still expect to vacuum up virtually all of the profits in the global smartphone business?

每年这个时候，都少不了同样的论调。iPhone系列产品是苹果公司最最重要的产品，而且大多数人也都会认同，它是这个星球上出现的最赚钱的产品，但对很多分析师来说，这种重要性恰恰突显了一种脆弱。所以科技观察人士又一次开始琢磨，苹果还能把这个奇迹维持多久。苹果的努力是否足以让它保持在业内遥遥领先的地位？iPhone接下来还能继续在全球智能手机市场上，独占几乎所有的利润吗？

It’s time to ease off from the ritualized annual fretting about the iPhone’s future. After several years of uncertainty about the iPhone’s long-term prospects, it’s clear that Apple has maneuvered the device into an enviable position, whatever the merits of its latest features. The iPhone’s continuing dominance may not be a sure thing, but in the tech industry, it’s as sure a thing as you can find right now.

大可不必这样一年一度地，对苹果公司的未来发展表达程式化的担忧。过去几年，人们一直对苹果的长期发展前景感到不确定，但苹果如今显然已将这款设备推到了其他厂商艳羡的地位，不管最新款功能如何，都不会改变这一点。或许我们无法断言iPhone能否继续主导市场，但在科技行业里，这是目前能发现的确定的事。

If this doesn’t surprise you, it should. In many fundamental ways, the iPhone breaks the rules of business, especially the rules of the tech business. Those rules have more or less always held that hardware devices keep getting cheaper and less profitable over time. That happens because hardware is easy to commoditize; what seems magical today is widely copied and becomes commonplace tomorrow. It happened in personal computers; it happened in servers; it happened in cameras, music players, and ― despite Apple’s best efforts ― it may be happening in tablets.

有些人觉得苹果能做到这一点没什么好大惊小怪的，但你应该感到惊讶。iPhone在很多方面打破了根本的商业规则，尤其是科技行业的规则。这些规则基本上一直认为，随着时间推移，硬件产品价格会变得更便宜，利润降低。之所以如此，是因为硬件容易商品化，今天看起来很神奇的东西，很快就会被广泛复制，不久就变得司空见惯。个人电脑如此；服务器如此；相机如此；音乐播放器如此；而尽管苹果付出了极大的努力，它的平板电脑产品有可能也正在经历这一过程。

In fact, commoditization has wreaked havoc in the smartphone business ― just not for Apple. In the last half-decade, sales of devices running Google’s Android operating system have far surpassed sales of Apple’s devices, and now account for the vast majority of smartphones in use.

事实上，商品化在智能手机领域也造成了大面积破坏，只有苹果手机幸免于难。过去五年，运行谷歌(Google)的Android操作系统的设备，销售额已经远远超过了苹果设备。在人们使用的智能手机当中，前者占了绝大多数。

For years, observers predicted that Android’s rising market share would in turn lead to lower profits for Apple (profits, not market share, being the point of business). If that had happened, it would have roughly approximated the way the Windows PC industry eclipsed Apple’s Mac business. “Hey, Apple, wake up ― it’s happening again,” Henry Blodget, of Business Insider, warned in 2010. And again in 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014.

过去数年里，观察人士一直预言，安卓手机市场份额不断增长，将会反过来拉低苹果的利润（利润，而非市场份额，才是商业经营的重点）。如果这种预言成真，那情形大概就像是当年安装Windows系统的个人电脑，吞噬苹果Mac产品的市场一样。“喂，苹果，醒醒吧――历史正在重演呢，”Business Insider网站总编亨利・布洛杰特(Henry Blodget)2010年曾经发出这样的警告。然后，在2011年、2012年、2013年和2014年，他又做出了同样的预言。

None of those predictions came true. While the iPhone’s sales growth slowed in 2013 and 2014, it rebounded to near-record levels later last year, and its profits have remained lofty.

这些预言都没有成真。尽管iPhone的销售增长在2013年和2014年有所放缓，但在去年底又反弹至接近历史最高的水平，而且其利润空间依然高不可及。

Instead of killing Apple, commoditization caused something stranger ― it hobbled Apple’s main competitor in the smartphone business: Samsung, which until last year was gaining a creeping share of the profits in the smartphone business. At its peak in mid-2013, Samsung was making close to half of every dollar in the smartphone business, according to the research firm Canaccord. (Apple was making the other half.)

商品化非但没有杀死苹果公司，反倒引发了更奇怪的事――它重创了苹果在智能手机领域的主要竞争对手三星(Samsung)，迟至去年年底，三星在智能手机市场的利润份额依然不见有明显增长。调研公司加通贝祥(Canaccord)的数据显示，在2013年中期的高峰时期，三星的营收将近占据了整个智能手机市场的半壁江山（另一半被苹果公司占据）。

But the rise of low-end, pretty great Android phones made by Chinese upstarts like Xiaomi ― and the surging popularity of Apple’s large-screen iPhones ― put Samsung in a bind. In July, Samsung reported its seventh straight quarter of declining profits. Canaccord’s latest estimate shows Samsung making 15 percent of profits in smartphones, with Apple making 92 percent. (The numbers add up to more than 100 because everyone else in the smartphone industry loses money, so their share of the profits is negative.)

但是，像小米这样的中国初创企业异军突起，推出了很棒的Android低端手机，而且苹果大屏幕的iPhone手机骤然流行，导致三星陷入了困境。今年7月，三星发布的数据显示，其利润已经连续第七个季度出现下降。加通贝祥的最新统计显示，三星在智能手机市场的利润份额大约只有15%，而苹果利润份额为92%。（两个数字相加超过100%，因为智能手机市场的其他品牌都在亏损，所以它们的利润份额是负数。）

You can expect Apple’s proportion to grow. As analysts at Credit Suisse explained in a note last week, only about 30 percent of the world’s 400 million iPhone users have upgraded to the large-screen models Apple introduced last year. Apple is bound to reap more money as the majority of its users inevitably jump to big phones over the next few years. In other words, for the foreseeable future, Apple stands virtually alone: It may be the only company making any money selling phones.

可以预测，苹果的份额还会增加。就像瑞信(Credit Suisse)分析师上周在一份纪要中所说明的，目前全球4亿iPhone用户中，只有30%的人升级成了苹果去年推出的大屏幕手机。接下来几年里，苹果的大部分用户势必会换上大屏幕手机，这也必定会为苹果创造更多营收。换句话说，在可预见的未来，苹果基本上仍然是无可匹敌的：它可能会是唯一一个卖手机还能赚钱的公司。

What’s driving the iPhone’s escape from the trap of commodity hardware is that it is more than a hardware device. Instead, an iPhone is a tightly integrated mix of hardware, great software, and several pretty good services rolled into a single gadget.

iPhone之所以没有陷入硬件商品的怪圈，是因为它不仅仅是一款硬件设备。相反，iPhone这款设备，将硬件和优秀的软件紧密结合，又集成了几项非常不错的服务。

Apple’s suite of services is far from perfect; as I’ve argued before, for many people, Google offers a better range of cloud services to run on an iPhone. Still, Apple’s services are good enough for most people, and as the company keeps expanding its ecosystem ― covering payments and home and health devices ― it will continue to build in different kinds of lock-ins for different kinds of users. Some people stay with the iPhone for its better App Store, others for iMessage, and many grandparents for FaceTime video calling and iCloud photo sharing. Just about everyone stays because they find Apple’s iOS mobile operating system simpler to navigate, and easier to maintain, than the fragmented Android landscape. Put it all together and you get a package that few of Apple’s rivals can replicate.

苹果的服务套件远远谈不上完美；就像我以前说过的，对很多人而言，谷歌在iPhone上提供了一系列更优秀的云服务。但苹果的服务对大多数人而言已经足够，而且随着苹果持续扩大其生态系统――覆盖支付服务和家居、健康设备――它还将继续为不同类型的用户嵌入不同的内置应用。有些人继续使用iPhone手机是因为喜欢其App Store，有些则是为使用iMessage，还有很多祖父祖母级的用户是为享受FaceTime视频电话服务和iCloud照片分享。而几乎所有人选择留下的理由都少不这个――相比于安卓系统的支离破碎，他们觉得苹果的iOS移动操作系统操作起来更简单，也更容易维护。几乎没有哪个苹果的竞争对手可以复制出这一整套东西。

But the iPhone is not just what it does, but what it means to its users ― which is directly a product of the savvy way Apple has designed and marketed the device to produce global lust. As the writer Ben Thompson has argued, the iPhone is in many ways a “Veblen good,” the economic term for a product whose high price actually increases its desirability. Apple’s resistance to selling low-end phones may thus feed into its success. IPhone resellers in Asia, for example, say that for many people, lower-end iPhones ― even used ones ― are seen as more desirable than more powerful, brand-new, but cheaper Android devices.

但iPhone之所以是iPhone，并不仅仅在于它可以做到什么，还在于它对用户意味着什么――这正是苹果的产品之道，即通过设计和营销使之成为让全世界人趋之若鹜的东西。就像博客作者本・汤普森(Ben Thompson)之前所说，从很多方讲，iPhone都称得上一件“维布伦商品”(Veblen good)，这是一个经济术语，用来指代那些产品定价高反倒增强自身吸引力的商品。苹果拒绝销售低端手机可能也恰恰造就了它的成功。比如，iPhone在亚洲的经销商就表示，对很多人来说，即便是相对低端一些的iPhone手机，甚至是二手的iPhone，也比功能更强大、价格更低的全新安卓手机更具吸引力。

Across large swaths of the globe, in other words, the iPhone is a status symbol, which is not to say that it’s frivolous ― unlike a Prada suit, the iPhone is one status symbol that you’ll still find extremely useful.

也就是说，在世界很多地方，iPhone成了一种身份象征，这倒不是说它肤浅――和Prada套装不同，iPhone在彰显身份的同时又极为有用。

Of course, Apple’s strategy is vulnerable to unpredictable shocks. Apple is betting on rising affluence across the globe to keep it in the black. If there’s a slowdown in this rise ― if the Chinese economy plunges, for instance, or, in the longer term, stagnant wages in Western countries push down consumers’ desires to spend as freely on their phones ― the iPhone will suffer. This explains why Timothy D. Cook, Apple’s chief executive, rushed to reassure investors about the company’s position in China during the recent Chinese market crisis.

当然，苹果的策略容易遭到一些不可预测的冲击。苹果押注的是全球财富增长可以持续。而如果这种增长减速，比如中国经济跳水，或者从更长远看，西方国家停滞不前的工资降低消费者随心购买手机的欲望，iPhone就会遭殃。这也解释了为什么苹果首席执行官蒂莫西・D・库克(Timothy D. Cook)会在最近中国股市遭遇危机时，急着向投资者保证苹果在中国的地位依然稳固。

For now, though, it’s difficult to conceive of a particular way in which Apple’s phone could fall to its rivals. Eight years after its introduction, the iPhone has won the biggest game in the world ― and it will keep winning.

不过，目前来看，很难想象有什么会让苹果手机输给竞争对手。面世八年以来，iPhone已经在这场全世界最重要的比赛中获胜，而且它还将继续独占鳌头。