外企为何需要适应印度国情

I rose before dawn in Mumbai recently to watch the city’s newspaper vendors get ready for their rounds.

最近的一天，我在破晓前起床，看着孟买的报商为当日的送报工作做准备。

Scores of men were squatting under the arches near the historic railway station, sorting thousands of papers in some 20 languages into teetering metre-high stacks, for distribution by bicycle.

几十个男人蹲在具有历史意义的火车站附近的拱门下，将大约20种文字的数千份报纸整理成许多一米来高、摇摇欲坠的小堆，以便用自行车送报。

The sellers commit each complex order to memory, not a computer algorithm in sight.

这些卖家将一笔笔复杂的订单记在心里，这里没有计算机算法的任何踪影。

For anyone who started in print journalism, as I did, it is an exciting scene.

对我这样从印刷传媒业开始职业生涯的人，这一幕令人兴奋。

But as a first-time visitor to the country, I also felt that the order-out-of-chaos underlined the challenge for foreign multinationals seeking to profit from India’s fabulous, fragmented, far-flung consumer market.

但作为一个首次到访印度的人，我也感觉到这种混乱中的秩序凸显出寻求从印度巨大、碎片化和地域广阔的消费者市场中获利的外国跨国公司所面临的挑战。

As one consultant I met said: The company that comes to India and is waiting for India to fix things is going to fail.

就如我遇到的一名咨询师所说的：那些来到印度，等待印度搞定一切的公司会失败。

The company that comes and marvels about how India has survived is going to do much better.

那些来到印度，惊叹印度是如何生存下来的公司会做得更好。

Such acts of tolerance and flexibility are hard for some big companies to carry off.

这种宽容和灵活态度对一些大公司来说难以做到。

For years, many have glibly summed up their strategy by touting versions of the think global, act local mantra.

多年来，许多大公司把自己的战略夸夸其谈地总结为不同版本的全球化思考，本地化行动箴言。

Only a few have made it work, among them Nokia, until it started concentrating too much power at its headquarters, and Nestlé, whose Maggi noodles were successful enough to attract Indian food inspectors’ unwelcome attention last year.

只有为数不多的几家公司真正让这条策略奏效，其中包括诺基亚(Nokia)，那是在该公司开始将过多权力集中于总部之前；还有就是雀巢(Nestlé)，去年该公司旗下的美极(Maggi)方便面因为在印度市场太成功而招致印度食品检验机构不受欢迎的关注。

As the complexity of newspaper distribution suggests, with its extraordinary logistical challenges (think of doing this job in a monsoon), acting local is not as simple as it sounds.

就如印度报纸配送的复杂性所表明的，由于不同寻常的物流挑战（想象一下在雨季送报的工作吧），本地化行动不像听上去那么简单。

For a start, which local?

首先，哪个本地？

There’s so little standardisation: every region has something that defines it, Amit Agarwal, who heads Amazon India, told me.

没有什么标准化可言：每个地区都有一些属于自己的特征，亚马逊印度(Amazon India)负责人阿米特.阿加瓦尔(Amit Agarwal)告诉我，

It’s like 25 different countries.

就像有25个不同国家似的。

Amazon — locked in combat with Indian competitors Flipkart and Snapdeal — is confident its wide selection will open Indian consumers’ wallets.

正与印度竞争对手Flipkart和Snapdeal角力的亚马逊相信，其提供的产品选择范围之广，足以让印度消费者甘愿掏腰包。

Mr Agarwal boasts he has brought guinea-pig food to small towns without pet stores (raising the question: what were India’s guinea pigs eating until now?).

阿加瓦尔夸耀，他已经把豚鼠粮引入到没有宠物店的小城镇（问题来了：那么在这之前，印度的豚鼠吃什么？）。

You can order online a dozen varieties of cow dung (for religious rituals), local food delicacies and the specialised grinders and mixers for preparing them.

你可以在线订购十多种不同种类的牛粪（用于宗教仪式）、当地美食和置备这些美食所需的特殊的粉碎机和搅拌机。

Small food suppliers’ ability to deal directly with faraway customers through online platforms means India might even miss the processed food revolution altogether, speculates Rama Bijapurkar, who advises companies on the consumer economy.

规模较小的食品供应商能够通过在线平台直接与相距遥远的客户打交道；为企业提供消费经济方面的建议的拉马.比加普卡尔(Rama Bijapurkar)推测，这意味着印度有可能完全错过加工食品革命。

On the same morning I visited the newspaper sellers I toured Mumbai’s fruit, vegetable, flower and fish markets.

在参观报商工作的同一天早上，我还参观了孟买的水果、蔬菜、花卉和鱼市场。

Their distribution system is literally run off the backs of workers earning 10 rupees — about 12p — per sack to manhandle produce.

它们的配送系统是在工人的背上运行的，这些工人每背一包农产品挣10卢比（约12便士）。

Multinationals rightly balk at trying to replace or tinker with that system.

理所应当地，跨国公司不太情愿尝试替换这个系统或者对其进行小修小补。

Companies working with a technology platform — Amazon, with its Amazon Now service, or Grofers, a homegrown start-up — piggyback on local stores that are already in the supply chain.

依托技术平台的企业——比如推出Amazon Now快递服务的亚马逊，或者印度本土初创企业Grofers——借助已经在供应链上的当地商铺来开展业务。

Fear of complexity may be one reason some multinationals shy away from or misread India.

对复杂性的恐惧或许是一些跨国公司回避或者误读印度的一个原因。

But in one sense, they are not misreading it at all.

但在某种层面上，它们或许根本没有误读。

The top fifth of India’s 1.3bn citizens earn as much as the next 60 per cent, although the disposable income of the top 20 per cent is nearly four times as great.

印度13亿人口中，收入最高的20%的人的收入与排在其后60%的人的收入相当，尽管前者的可支配收入是后者的近4倍之多。

In short, it is perfectly rational for multinationals not to bother acting local for the bottom billion.

简言之，对跨国公司而言，不费心针对处于底层的10亿人采取本地化策略是完全理性的。

The megabrand strategy that works well for them in developed markets can cream off the sort of high-spending consumers targeted by the house-sized advertising hoardings that lord it over Mumbai’s stall-cluttered streets.

在发达市场对这些企业管用的大品牌战略，在印度有望吸引高消费人群，屹立在孟买摊位杂乱的街道上的巨幅广告牌瞄准的正是这一群体。

If you ask ‘What’s the market [if I] sweat my existing model and assets,’ you still have a fairly large number, Ms Bijapurkar points out.

如果你问‘（如果我）运用我现有的模式和资产，市场会是什么样子’，答案是你依然拥有相当多的客户，比加普卡尔指出。

Tailoring strategy to local conditions is also hard and potentially costly work.

按照当地情况量身定做策略也很困难，而且有可能代价高昂。

Bhavish Aggarwal, founder of Ola, the local ride-hailing company fighting Uber, says you need to build the infrastructure of your industry — which is why Ola is buying cars and training drivers.

与优步(Uber)竞争的当地招车公司Ola的创始人巴维什.阿加沃尔(Bhavish Aggarwal)说，你需要建立起你所在行业的基础设施——这就是Ola购置车辆，培训司机的原因。

In India, you can’t be a disrupter because nothing exists: we have to be a creator, he says,

在印度，你不可能成为扰乱者，因为什么都不存在：我们不得不成为创造者，他说。

in a jab at his notoriously disruptive US rival.

此言是在暗讽以扰乱市场著称的美国竞争对手优步。

By not adapting, however, foreign companies risk missing a very large trick.

然而，如果不去适应当地，外国公司有错失大量业务的风险。

Data collected by Ms Bijapurkar suggest that over the 10 years to 2013-14, the income of the poorest 20 per cent of Indian households grew annually at more than triple the rate of the richest fifth and will continue to grow almost as fast in the years ahead.

比加普卡尔收集的数据似乎表明，在截至2013-14年度的10年里，印度最贫困20%家庭的收入增长速度是最富裕20%家庭的3倍，而未来几年还将大致保持这样的增速。

Poorer consumers will always aspire to dearer brands.

更贫困的消费者总会向往更昂贵的品牌。

Some will start buying them.

一些人将会开始购买它们。

But the opportunity is such that local companies and Chinese suppliers are already expanding by appealing to Indian customers ignored by multinationals and by serving their local tastes better.

但这个机会如此诱人，以至于当地企业和中国供应商已经在扩张，以吸引跨国公司忽视的印度消费者，并且更好地服务于他们的品味。

By the time haughtier multinationals wake up to the rest of India, it could be too late.

当更加自负的跨国公司认识到印度还有大量消费者值得迎合，可能已经为时太晚。