谷歌的中国雄心不止于搜索引擎

BEIJING — Google has faced sharp criticism, including from its own employees, for its efforts to rebuild an internet search presence in China after quitting the country eight years ago over censorship issues.

北京——由于在中国努力重建互联网搜索引擎的努力，八年前因为审查问题退出了中国的谷歌(Google)，面临着包括来自员工的尖锐批评。

But for Google’s corporate parent, Alphabet, the opportunities in the world’s largest internet market may be too good to resist. And the full scope of the company’s interest in China now appears to be broader than just internet search.

但对谷歌的母公司“字母表”(Alphabet)来说，这个世界上最大的互联网市场的机会太过诱人，令它难以抗拒。而如今这家公司在中国的兴趣范围似乎不限于搜索引擎。

The latest hint came from Waymo, the driverless-car company that was spun out of Google in 2016. Chinese media noticed this week that the business had quietly registered a Shanghai subsidiary in May, suggesting that it wants a piece of an industry that the Chinese government has made a priority.

最新的暗示来自于Waymo，这是一家2016年从谷歌剥离出来的无人驾驶汽车公司。中国媒体本周注意到，这家企业五月悄然在上海注册了一家子公司，表明它想在中国政府置于优先地位的行业中分一杯羹。

Other recent steps that Google has taken in China include opening a research center and promoting its software tools to developers.

谷歌近期在中国迈出的其他步伐包括开设一家研究中心、向开发人员推广其软件工具。

In artificial intelligence and other areas in which Alphabet is seeking to advance the technological frontier, China today is more than just the planet’s biggest audience of internet users. It is an ecosystem of sophisticated potential business partners, talent and tech-hungry customers from which tomorrow’s innovations could emerge.

在“字母表”寻求推进科技前线的人工智能及其他领域中，如今的中国已经不仅仅是全球最大的互联网用户群体，而是一个由成熟的潜在商业伙伴、人才及对科技需求极大的客户组成的生态系统，在其中，可能会产生未来的创新。

Other American tech giants have made their peace in various ways with Beijing’s strictures and conditions for operating in the country. Unlike Google, Apple runs its own app store in China, heeding government directives about the kinds of apps that can be available to Chinese users. Microsoft and Amazon offer cloud computing services, working with local partners and following strict controls on how customers’ data is stored.

其他美国科技巨头已经以各种各样的方式，接受了北京对其在中国运营的限制和条件。与谷歌不同，苹果(Apple)在中国运营自己的应用商店，遵照政府关于能够向中国用户开放下载的应用程序类型的要求。微软(Microsoft)和亚马逊(Amazon)提供云计算服务，与本土伙伴合作，并且严格遵守关于用户数据储存方式的管控。

Alphabet’s investments in future technologies make it particularly important for the company to get a foot into China early. Driverless cars have prompted regulatory and political debate, which means starting sooner could help reduce Chinese authorities’ concerns. More time in China for Waymo also means more experience on Chinese roads for its cars, and more data collected on the country’s driving environment.

“字母表”对未来科技的投资，让早日踏足这个国家对该公司变得尤为重要。无人驾驶汽车已经引发了监管和政治方面的辩论，这意味着早些开始，有助于减轻中国当局的担忧。Waymo在中国获得更多时间，也意味着它的汽车能对中国的道路更加有经验，也能在这个国家的驾驶环境中收集到更多数据。

“I think they’ve realized that developing in the United States won’t produce a car that will work in China,” said Gansha Wu, the chief executive and a co-founder of Uisee, an autonomous vehicle start-up in Beijing. “The road conditions are totally different.”

“我认为他们意识到了，在美国开发做不出来能在中国开的车，”北京的自动驾驶汽车初创企业驭势科技CEO、联合创始人吴甘沙说。“路况完全不同”。

A Google spokeswoman said the company did not have a comment for this article.

谷歌的发言人表示，公司对这篇报道不作置评。

For Alphabet, any play at significant expansion in China would bring unique challenges.

对“字母表”来说，在中国进行重大扩张的任何尝试都会带来独特的挑战。

Its major moneymaking activities, such as search and video, run up against the Communist Party’s controls on information in a way that online shopping, for instance, does not.

该公司主要的赚钱业务，例如搜索及视频——不同于网络购物等——与共产党对信息的控制背道而驰。

Google would have to overcome a lack of name recognition among young Chinese. And it would face a tough fight against homegrown incumbents with Silicon Valley-like money to burn — including in areas like self-driving cars, in which Alphabet is arguably the global leader.

谷歌需要克服在中国的年轻人群体中认知度不够的问题。并且还将面临着与本土企业的一场苦战，而这些企业都有着像硅谷一样可以用来烧钱的大笔资金——包括自动驾驶汽车这样的领域，而“字母表”在这一领域毋庸置疑是全球领导者。

Waymo’s company registration in China still puts it a long way from having wheels on the road. Its Shanghai subsidiary has an initial capitalization of about $500,000. A visit on Friday to the address listed on its registration filing turned up only a cramped, unmarked office, empty but for some simple furniture.

Waymo在中国的公司注册远远无法令它能够上路行驶。其上海子公司的初始资本金约为50万美元。周五记者前往注册文件中列出的地址时，看到的是一个狭小的、没有标记的办公室，里面空空荡荡，只有一些简单的家具。

Even with more investment, Waymo’s place in the Chinese market is hardly assured.

即使增加投资，Waymo在中国市场的地位也难以保证。

Baidu, maker of the country’s leading search engine, has made its autonomous-vehicle software platform available to dozens of local and foreign companies. SAIC Motor, China’s largest carmaker, is working with the e-commerce titan Alibaba. BMW and Daimler have received permission in China to test their own self-driving vehicles.

百度是中国领先的搜索引擎提供者，已经为数十家本土和外国公司提供自动驾驶汽车软件平台。中国最大的汽车制造商上海汽车集团正在与电子商务巨头阿里巴巴合作。宝马和戴姆勒(Daimler)已经获准在中国测试自己的自动驾驶汽车。

That might leave only China’s newer, smaller automakers for Waymo should it someday seek a local partner for building intelligent cars, said Yale Zhang, managing director at Automotive Foresight, a consultancy in Shanghai.

上海咨询公司前瞻(Automotive Foresight)的总经理张豫表示，这可能会令Waymo在寻找当地合作伙伴建造智能汽车时，只能更新、更小的汽车制造商可供选择。

“That’s their chance,” Mr. Zhang said.

“这是他们的机会，”张豫说。

A Waymo spokeswoman confirmed that the company had set up and staffed a legal entity in China, but declined to comment on further plans.

Waymo发言人证实，该公司已在中国成立了一家法人实体，并已招募员工，但拒绝对进一步的计划发表评论。

Alphabet began taking baby steps to expand in China well before word got out this month about Google’s work on a censored search engine, code-named Dragonfly. This year, Google released a file-management app for Chinese users and a game on the popular social media tool WeChat. It recently opened a research center devoted to artificial intelligence and has invested in local companies, including the retailer JD.com.

本月关于谷歌在从事代号为“蜻蜓”的审查版搜索引擎消息传出之前，“字母表”就已开始在中国进行小规模扩张。今年，谷歌为中国用户发布了一个文件管理应用程序，并在流行的社交媒体工具微信上发布了一款游戏。它最近开设了一个致力于人工智能的研究中心，并投资了包括零售商京东在内的本土企业。

Google never quit China entirely after shuttering its search engine here in 2010, citing censorship requirements and hacking attacks. But Beijing’s online controls have tightened in recent years, sometimes ensnaring even domestically run social media outlets. Last month, Facebook won approval to open a subsidiary in the eastern province of Zhejiang — only to see that approval quickly withdrawn.

2010年谷歌以审查要求和黑客攻击为由关闭在华搜索引擎后，它从未真正放弃中国。但近年来，北京的网络控制措施已经收紧，有时甚至令本土经营的社交媒体受限。上个月，Facebook获准在东部省份浙江省开设子公司——然而批准很快就被撤回了。

If Google wanted to serve Chinese search users, it would face a formidable rival. For most Chinese, Baidu, which has a market capitalization of more than $70 billion, is about as synonymous with search as Google is for people elsewhere.

如果谷歌想为中国搜索用户提供服务，它将面临一个强大的竞争对手。对于大多数中国人来说，市值超过700亿美元的百度就像谷歌对于其他地方的人一样，也是搜索的代名词。

Smaller Chinese search engines receive relatively little traffic on their own apps and websites, said Juan Lin, an analyst in Shanghai with the research firm 86Research. Many of their queries come to them from external sources, such as WeChat — a sign of how little influence they command among Chinese web users, and of how much dominance Baidu enjoys.

研究公司86Research的上海分析师林娟表示，较小的中国搜索引擎在自己的应用程序和网站上获得的流量相对较少。它们的许多请求来自外部来源，例如微信——这表明它们在中国网民中的影响力很小，以及百度享有极大的支配地位。

There is another problem for Google.

谷歌还有另一个问题。

“Search itself doesn’t have as strong a presence these days compared to 2010,” Ms. Lin said. Instead, she said, a big chunk of Chinese advertisers’ money now goes to newsfeed apps such as Jinri Toutiao, which serves people fresh articles and videos based on what they have read and watched in the past. Such apps, too, must be policed extensively.

“与2010年相比，如今的搜索本身并没有那么强大的力量，”林娟说。她说，中国广告客户的大部分资金现在都投入在新闻报道应用程序，例如今日头条，它根据用户过去阅读和观看的内容，为他们提供新鲜的文章和视频。此类应用程序也必须受到广泛监管。

Another potential avenue to more sales for Google in China would be to win permission to operate Google Play, its store for apps and digital media. Hundreds of millions of smartphones in the country use Google’s Android operating system, but people download apps from a variety of third-party sources.

谷歌在中国获得更多销售额的另一个潜在途径，是获得运营其应用和数字媒体商店Google Play的许可。该国数以亿计的智能手机使用谷歌的安卓操作系统，但人们从各种第三方来源下载应用程序。

For that, Google would likely need local help to win Beijing’s regulatory blessing. One potential ally is Tencent, the video game and social media behemoth. The two companies recently completed a deal to share patents. Tencent also offers cloud computing services. Google executives have said that they hope to make their cloud business a global operation, something that would be hard to achieve without being in China.

为此，谷歌可能需要来自本土的帮助，才能赢得北京监管部门的认可。一个潜在的盟友是视频游戏和社交媒体巨头腾讯。这两家公司最近达成了一项专利共享协议。腾讯还提供云计算服务。谷歌高管表示，他们希望将自己的云业务打造成全球业务，如果不进入中国这就很难实现。

Making friends could benefit Google in other ways. It could cut deals with software companies to have its search engine embedded in their mobile browsers, or team up with phone makers to have its apps preinstalled on their devices.

结交朋友可以在其他方面使谷歌受益。它可以同软件公司达成交易，将其搜索引擎嵌入到它们的移动浏览器中，或者与手机制造商合作，在其设备上预装其应用程序。

In all of these areas, Google would need to overcome wariness among potential Chinese partners, said Ms. Lin of 86Research.

Google left China in 2010 in a huff. 86Research的林娟表示，在所有这些领域，谷歌都需要克服潜在中国合作伙伴的戒心。谷歌在2010年离开中国时非常愤怒。

“Who would want to partner with a company that exited China because of its slogan of ‘Don’t be evil’?” she said.

“谁愿意与一家因为‘不做恶’的口号而退出中国的公司合作?”她说。