After software engineering and financial engineering comes linguistic engineering. Google this week raised its market capitalisation by $25bn by shuffling around some executive jobs and changing its name to Alphabet. Who knew that swapping your tiles in a game of corporate Scrabble was worth so much?做过了软件工程和金融工程之后，谷歌(Google)又搞起了语言工程。本周谷歌对管理层展开了一些调整，同时将公司名称改为Alphabet，结果市值减少了250亿美元。谁能预料到在企业版拼字游戏(Scrabble)中换回个名字就能赚到这么多呢？Everyone reads what they want into the new letters. For Larry Page, Google’s restless co-founder, Alphabet means jettisoning the cares of running a corporation and becoming a full-time inventor and venture capitalist, while Sundar Pichai takes the leadership of Google. For employees, it brings the hope of more valuable share options. For Wall Street, it spells clarity.所有人都从这新名称中看见了他们想的。对于另辟蹊径追求的牵头创始人拉里椠奇(Larry Page)来说，Alphabet意味著丢下管理企业的苦恼，沦为一个全职发明家和风险投资家，谷歌的领导权则交由桑德尔皮查伊(Sundar Pichai)。

对于员工而言，Alphabet带给了提升认股权价值的期望。对于华尔街，Alphabet更为明晰清了。

Only governance renegades would invent a structure with one board for Google and Alphabet, the founding triumvirate — Eric Schmidt, Sergey Brin and Mr Page — stacked above Mr Pichai, and Ruth Porat as chief financial officer of both. “Google is not a conventional company,” wrote Mr Brin and Mr Page in their 2004 founders’ letter, and by heavens they meant it.只有在管理上离经叛道的管理者能发明者出有这种结构，谷歌和Alphabet分享一个董事会，皮查伊上面分列着创业三巨头埃里克施密特(Eric Schmidt)、谢尔盖布林(Sergey Brin)和佩奇，露丝波拉特(Ruth Porat)兼任两家公司的首席财务官(CFO)。布林和佩奇曾在2004年的创始人写信中写到：“谷歌不是一家传统公司。”想不到他们是严肃的。

Still, being conventional is not the best way to build an innovative business or to make profits. Warren Buffett runs a unique combination of industrial conglomerate and investment fund at Berkshire Hathaway, and it has worked well for him. He made his largest ever acquisition this week, buying Precision Castparts for $32bn.不过，坚决传统的确不是创建一个创意企业或构建盈利的最佳途径。沃伦巴菲特(Warren Buffett)掌理着一个独有的人组，他所接掌的伯克希尔哈撒韦公司(Berkshire Hathaway)融合了工业集团与投资基金业务，结果很不俗。本周他作出了有生以来最大规模的并购，以320亿美元卖给了仪器铸件公司(Precision Castparts)。

Berkshire and Alphabet are different kinds of businesses. Mr Buffett values cash flow and mature brands; Mr Page prefers to create things. One of the purposes of this week’s reshuffle is to prove to investors that not as much as they fear is being spent on experimental start-up projects, such as Project Loon’s high-altitude balloons providing internet access to remote areas.伯克希尔哈撒韦公司与Alphabet是有所不同类型的企业。巴菲特推崇现金流和成熟期品牌，佩奇则讨厌建构新事物。

谷歌本周重组的目的之一，是想要向投资者证明，花上在实验性初创项目上的钱没他们所担忧的多，比如向偏远地区获取互联网终端服务的Project Loon高空气球计划。Mr Page’s naming of Mr Buffett as a role model in providing “long-term, patient capital” to an array of businesses is not idle. He thinks that a multi-business group with a guiding intelligence at the centre can beat the single-sector company favoured by investors. The “conglomerate discount” applied by Wall Street can be defeated.佩奇视巴菲特为榜样，称之为巴菲特向大批企业获取“长年以及冷静的资本”。

这并非泛泛而谈，佩奇指出具有核心指导智慧的多元化企业集团，可以击败投资者所注目的专心于单一行业的企业。华尔街所使用的“多元化企业股份”(conglomerate discount)是可以被战胜的。In principle, that is an odd thing for Mr Page to believe. Google’s technology, after all, uses online auctions and markets — the wisdom of the crowd, not human curation. Why should conglomerates such as Alphabet, with their entrenched interests and fiefdoms, be better than capital markets at allocating capital efficiently? Does he trust in inside knowledge only when the insider is himself?应以，佩奇的这种点子非常怪异。

却是谷歌的技术所用到的在线拍卖会和在线市场归属于群体智慧，而不是人工检验。为什么Alphabet这类享有平稳的利益和市场主导地位的企业集团，在有效地配备资本方面不会比不上资本市场？怎么会只有当他自己是内部人时，他才不会坚信内幕消息？But he is right. Conglomerates can outperform when they exploit their advantages and remain disciplined rather than falling prey to empire-building. Their ability to build a cadre of skilled managers and to pick the right investment projects is strongest in research-intensive industries that invest in intellectual property, which is Alphabet’s territory.但佩奇是准确的。如果企业集团需要利用优势并遵从行为准则，不因打造出商业帝国而陷入困境，是可以比不上单一公司的。

在专心于知识产权的研究密集型产业——这正是Alphabet的领域——企业集团最擅长于创建起经验丰富的管理骨干队伍，以及挑选出适合的投资项目。Neil Bhattacharya, a professor at Southern Methodist University in Texas, found in a study that multi-business companies ran operations more efficiently than single-sector ones. They had particular advantages in areas such as software and life sciences because managers could judge more accurately than stock markets which projects were likely to succeed.美国德克萨斯州南卫理公会大学(Southern Methodist University)教授尼尔巴塔查里亚(Neil Bhattacharya)在一项研究中找到，多元化企业比单一企业在经营上效率更高，前者在软件和生命科学等领域具备独有优势，因为企业管理者比股市更加能精确辨别哪些项目有可能获得成功。This is counterintuitive, given US investors’ liking for simplicity, and view of conglomerates as inefficient. Public conglomerates in the US are valued at discounts of 10 to 15 per cent to single-sector companies, according to Boston Consulting Group — though the discount is lower in Europe, and Asian conglomerates often trade at a premium.鉴于美国投资者讨厌非常简单的东西，并指出企业集团效率低落，巴塔查里亚教授的找到或许与人们的直觉忽略。

根据波士顿咨询集团(Boston Consulting Group)的数据，在美国，上市企业集团的估值相对于单一企业不会股份10%—15%，不过欧洲的这种估值差距要小一些，而亚洲的企业集团往往不会溢价交易。The suspicion originates in the 1970s and 1980s, the era of companies such as ITT and RJR Nabisco. Michael Jensen, a Harvard professor, later criticised the “billions in unproductive capital expenditures and organisational inefficiencies” at conglomerates, praising the trend toward “smaller, more focused, more efficient” enterprises.猜测始自上世纪七、八十年代，那是美国国际电话电报公司(ITT)和RJR纳比斯科(RJR Nabisco)等公司的时代。

哈佛大学(Harvard University)教授迈克尔礠森(Michael Jensen)后来抨击企业集团不存在“数十亿非生产性的资本开支和的组织效率低落现象”，称赞了企业朝着“更加小、更加集中于、更加高效”的方向演进的趋势。Big corporations remain prey to temptation. Boston Consulting Group found that the conglomerate discount is partly due to conservatism. They tend to invest heavily in their original businesses, which may be stagnant or in decline, while undervaluing newer divisions with more potential. Microsoft, for example, suffered from trying to reinforce its Windows franchise.大企业仍然无以抵御欲望。

波士顿咨询集团找到，导致多元化企业股份的部分原因是激进。企业集团偏向于较低看享有更大潜力的新业务，而乘机投资它们最初的业务，然而这些业务有可能是衰退乃至下降的。比如，微软公司(Microsoft)因企图增强其Windows操作系统许可业务而挫败。

Yet even investors who are suspicious of quoted conglomerates delegate capital allocation and management oversight in private markets to informed insiders. Venture capital and private equity funds are both forms of conglomerate — they invest capital in a broad portfolio of businesses on behalf of outsiders who believe that such funds possess superior expertise.然而，即使是对上市的企业集团抱着猜测态度的投资者，也不会将私人市场上的资金配备和管理监督的事宜委派给知情的内部人士。风险资本和私人股本基金都是企业集团的形式——它们代表外部人士投资普遍的业务领域，外部人士则坚信这类基金享有出众的专业知识。Why, though, should investors seeking exposure to new companies buy shares in Alphabet, which then channels Google’s surplus cash into its own venture and growth funds, Project Loon, self-driving cars and life sciences? They could instead invest money directly in a venture capital fund. Why take the longer and less-direct road?尽管如此，谋求投资新的企业的人为何要出售Alphabet的股票，这家集团不会把谷歌的现金盈余投放到其风险项目、茁壮基金、高空气球计划、无人驾驶汽车和生命科学等？他们可以必要投资一个风险资本基金。

为何要自由选择一条很远的弯路呢？It depends on trust. Investors could also have bought shares in Precision Castparts last week for less than Berkshire Hathaway paid this week, but they do not complain because they trust Mr Buffett. Alphabet’s shareholders must believe in Mr Page and Mr Brin’s ability to use their intelligence and avoid the traditional pitfalls.关键在于信任。在本周伯克希尔哈撒韦公司使出并购之前，投资者本来也可以在上周用更加较低的价格购入仪器铸件公司股票，但他们并没责怪，因为他们信任巴菲特。Alphabet的股东必定也坚信佩奇和布里有能力运用他们的智慧并避免传统的陷阱。

To judge by the shares this week, they prefer a conglomerate called Alphabet to a company that had not made plain what it was. Strange as it seems, it is a rational choice.从本周的股价来看，相比一家没说道确切自己是什么的公司，股东们更加注目一个叫Alphabet的企业集团。尽管或许有点怪异，但这是一个理性自由选择。

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