優(yōu)步的戰(zhàn)略在美國管用，原封不動地照搬到國外則未必行。

優(yōu)步（Uber）最近透露，該公司在中國市場的虧損額度每年超過10億美元。這對于任何一家公司來說都是一筆巨款，更何況是一家成立不到十年的公司。雖然虧損數(shù)額令人咂舌，不過，優(yōu)步卻表示，它在中國市場的虧損并沒有什么好擔心的。

優(yōu)步創(chuàng)始人、首席執(zhí)行官特拉維斯?卡蘭尼克也表示，優(yōu)步在中國的形勢明顯好于主要本土競爭對手——滴滴快的。而且他相信，通過利用其他地區(qū)的盈利向中國市場提供補貼，優(yōu)步是能挺過早期在中國市場的這段艱難歷程的。

我本人則認為，優(yōu)步在中國的發(fā)展并不樂觀。我認為，優(yōu)步在中國的巨虧，是該公司在全球戰(zhàn)略上存在深層問題的表象，暴露出優(yōu)步在戰(zhàn)略上存在一些嚴重缺陷。

當企業(yè)在海外擴展時，經常會面臨陌生的文化、政治和經濟環(huán)境，從而給這套在母國行之有效的業(yè)務模式帶來額外的、不可預見的壓力。同時，他們還面臨著更了解當?shù)厍闆r的本土競爭對手。

沒有一家科技公司比優(yōu)步更劇烈地經歷了這些困難。在不到七年的時間里，優(yōu)步已經從北美擴展到了每一片有人居住的大陸上——包括歐洲、亞洲、南美洲、非洲和澳洲。有一陣子，優(yōu)步幾乎是以每天進入一個新城市的速度在擴張。最近，優(yōu)步甚至還在泰國和印度等地開辟了人力車和摩托車的叫車服務?？梢哉f，優(yōu)步在產品和地緣上的擴展速度是史無前例的。

那么，如此迅速的全球擴張給優(yōu)步帶來了怎樣的效益？可以說，效益要比期望低得多，而困難卻比期望多得多……而且這不僅僅是在中國市場。讓我們詳細來看。

優(yōu)步光是在美國本土就遇到了不少困難。優(yōu)步的傳統(tǒng)戰(zhàn)略，是首先迅速攻入一個新陣地，把法律和監(jiān)管后果留在以后解決。優(yōu)步的支持者往往會稱贊它的創(chuàng)新性、便捷性、迅速性、以及（沒有猛增的）價格，但同時也有不少批評者指出，優(yōu)步的運營方式應該被譴責，因為它的叫車服務明顯違反了當?shù)氐姆煞ㄒ?guī)。好在優(yōu)步在美國的很多城市都較好地搞定了當?shù)卣秃捅O(jiān)管機構。

優(yōu)步首先堅稱自己是一家軟件公司，它只是在交通服務的供應者（出租車司機）與消費者（乘客）之間建立了一道聯(lián)系。因此，優(yōu)步認為應該完全由它的承包商（出租車司機）來承擔守法合規(guī)的責任，而不是由優(yōu)步來擔責。

比如，優(yōu)步曾在紐約出庭應訴，捍衛(wèi)自己運營電子叫車服務的權力，與傳統(tǒng)出租車公司進行針尖對麥芒的交鋒，并且最終獲得勝訴。而且優(yōu)步還在邁阿密、舊金山和圣路易斯等多座城市進行了成功的游說，使這些城市按照其訴求修改了相關法律。

但在美國以外，優(yōu)步就沒有如此幸運了。除了在中國的虧損被廣泛報道，優(yōu)步在歐洲的發(fā)展也舉步維艱。

這家年輕的科技公司在全球擴張的過程中犯了一個經典的錯誤：它天真地以為，那套令它在美國市場成功斬獲龍頭老大地位的業(yè)務模式和營銷模式，套用到其他國家也能一樣順利。它嚴重低估了在經濟、政治和文化環(huán)境都全然不同的國家運營時可能遭遇的挑戰(zhàn)。

比如，說到政治環(huán)境的差異，優(yōu)步那種百無禁忌的“先進入，再請求原諒（而不是允許）”的套路，更適用于英美法系國家。在美國和英國等英美法系國家，法律法規(guī)往往更加靈活，更注重司法解釋。因此，優(yōu)步在為其業(yè)務的合法性進行辯護的時候，也就能夠取得更好的結果。

而在中國、法國、德國、西班牙以及歐洲大部，即所謂的大陸法系國家里，優(yōu)步的這種進入方式是比較困難的。大陸法系是在羅馬法的基礎上建立的，主要基于法理、核心原則和法典。因此，大陸法系國家的法律往往更為死板，司法系統(tǒng)的職能更偏重于對法律的執(zhí)行而非解讀。因此，這些國家對于優(yōu)步“打法律擦邊球”的運營方式采取較為反對的立場，也就是意料之中的事了。

還有非常重要的一點，就是優(yōu)步并沒有充分認識到美國與其他國家在文化上的細微差異，因此在這些國家里沒有得到“民心”。美國是一個高度個人主義的社會，鼓勵個體保持個性，追求個人利益。而在亞洲以及法國、西班牙等部分歐洲國家，對集體和諧和社會秩序的重視往往超過個人成就。這些國家往往更重視其他人，更重視人際關系、親情和團結友愛。因此，由于優(yōu)步往往采取激進的進入策略，且對地方當局不夠重視，并且沒有在本地培養(yǎng)出真誠和信任的社會關系，因此消費者對其不夠信任，也就沒有什么好奇怪的了。

由于錯誤解讀了所在國的政治和文化環(huán)境，加之采取了有瑕疵的全球擴張策略，因而優(yōu)步不僅在中國虧損了10億美金，它在很多其他國家，面對滴滴快的之類的本土競爭對手，也表現(xiàn)出了明顯的劣勢。比如，它在法國、德國、西班牙、荷蘭和比利時的部分地區(qū)都遭到了“封殺”，理由是故意無視和違反當?shù)胤?，致使司機和乘客遭遇危險。而且，優(yōu)步還在多個國家遭到了強烈抵制——多地發(fā)生了針對優(yōu)步的抗議、騷亂；優(yōu)步還與激憤的工會組織發(fā)生了激烈沖突。此外還有無休止的用戶投訴。

那么，優(yōu)步如何才能避免這些問題？

首先，這家年輕有為的公司應該認識到，中國、印度和歐洲等市場的經濟潛力雖然已經成熟，但它們與美國有著方方面面的巨大差異。優(yōu)步應仔細檢討自己的政策和策略，看看它們是否適合各個所在國。

其次，不管有多耗費時間，優(yōu)步都應該先向有權機構爭得運營許可，并藉此表達它對現(xiàn)有制度和規(guī)矩的尊重，如果這樣的話，優(yōu)步的運營可能會更順利些。

第三，優(yōu)步應該投入一些時間與精力，與代表出租車司機的工會組織建立良好的關系，而不是通過激進的進入策略，挑起本地工會的敵對反應。

另外，通過合作模式來規(guī)避各國的獨有風險，也有助于優(yōu)步免于遭受很多政治和社會面的抵制，同時也有助于在文化上親近本地消費者群體。而且這也有助于令優(yōu)步成為本地市場上的一個更加強大的競爭者。

雖然本文的標題說的是優(yōu)步在中國遇到的問題，但優(yōu)步在全球遇到的問題遠遠不止于中國。而且對于其他正在走全球化道路的企業(yè)來說，無論規(guī)模大小，無論從事什么行業(yè)，優(yōu)步暴露出的問題存在共性。這也再次表明，在當今全球化的市場中，充分了解各國的政治、文化和經濟環(huán)境，并相應地對企業(yè)的業(yè)務戰(zhàn)略做出調整，具有何等重要的意義。（財富中文網(wǎng)）

本文作者羅伯特?薩魯曼是紐約大學斯特恩商學院國際管理學副教授，也是《全球視野：企業(yè)如何避免全球化陷阱》一書的作者。

譯者：樸成奎

What made the startup successful in the U.S. won’t work elsewhere.

Uber recently revealed that it is losing more than $1 billion per year in China. This is a colossal sum of money for any company, let alone one that has been in business for less than a decade. Despite the eye-popping headline number, Uber claims that its losses in China are nothing to be concerned about. According to its chief executive and founder Travis Kalanick, Uber is in a much better market position than its chief Chinese rival, Didi Kuadi, and he believes Uber can weather its early stumbles there by subsidizing losses with profits from other operations.

I am not so sure I take such a rosy view of Uber’s plight in China. I think they are symptomatic of deeper-seated global strategy problems and that they reveal some serious strategic flaws.

When companies expand abroad, they face unfamiliar cultural, political, and economic environments that put additional, unforeseen pressures on their domestic business models. They also face competitors who understand the local environment far better than they do.

No technology company has experienced these difficulties more acutely than Uber. In fewer than seven years, Uber has managed to expand from North America to every populated continent – Europe, Asia, South America, Africa, and Australia. At one point Uber was entering one new city per day. And if that weren’t enough, Uber recently expanded its offerings in markets like Thailand and India with a rickshaw and motorbike service. That kind of growth in product and geographic scope is unprecedented.

So what does Uber have to show for all of this global expansion? Much less than it had hoped, and much more difficulty than it had anticipated, …and not just in China. Let’s take a closer look.

Uber has faced its fair share of difficulty in the US. Uber’s traditional approach has been to enter quickly and stake a claim to a new territory first, leaving the legal and regulatory ramifications for later. Though proponents laud its innovativeness, convenience, speed, and (non-surge) prices, detractors suggest that Uber is operating in a morally reprehensible way by running an illegal taxi service that clearly violates local regulations. To its credit, Uber has largely been able to placate regulators and politicians in various US cities. For starters, it maintains that it is a software company that merely connects suppliers (taxi drivers) with customers (fares). As such, it argues that the onus of regulatory compliance falls squarely on its contractors (the taxi drivers) and not on Uber. It has prevailed in courts in New York, for example, defending its right to operate an electronic taxi hailing service and compete head-to-head against traditional yellow cabs. It has also convinced politicians in various US cities—e.g., Miami, San Francisco, and St. Louis—to change existing laws in its favor.

But Uber has not been so lucky outside the US. Beyond its well-documented troubles in China, it is also struggling in Europe. The young tech company has committed a classic globalization mistake: it naively assumed that its business model and market approach, which ultimately solidified its market-leading position in the U.S., could translate just as seamlessly to other countries. It severely underestimated the challenges of operating in countries that embody totally different economic, political, and cultural environments.

For example, when it comes to political differences, Uber’s devil-may-care approach of asking for forgiveness (instead of for permission) works better in countries with legal systems based in common law. In common law countries like the US and the UK, laws and regulations are more flexible and subject to judicial interpretation. Uber is therefore afforded greater latitude when arguing the legality of its case in the courts of law. Such an entry approach is difficult, however, in civil law countries like China, France, Germany, Spain, and much of continental Europe. Civil law systems have their foundation in Roman Law and are based on doctrine, core principles, and codified rules. As a result, laws are more rigid and the role of the judicial system is to enforce, rather than interpret, the law. In that sense, an adversarial stance toward Uber’s less-than-by-the-book adherence to the law should have been expected.

Critically, Uber also failed to properly acknowledge the subtle and nuanced cultural differences between the US and foreign countries, thereby failing to win in the court of public opinion. The US has a particularly strong emphasis on individualist principles: individuals are encouraged to take chances to assert their individuality and pursue their individual self-interests. But in Asia, and in European countries like France and Spain, group harmony and societal order are stressed over individual achievement. There is a greater concern for others, a greater emphasis placed on personal relationships, and a greater sense of kinship and solidarity built into each country’s social compact. It is therefore not surprising that local consumers are skeptical of Uber’s aggressive entry tactics, lack of consideration for local authorities, and inability to foster genuine and trusting local relationships.

As a consequence of misreading political and cultural environments and adopting a flawed approach to global expansion, not only is Uber losing more than $1 billion in China, but it is at a distinct disadvantage to local companies like Didi Kuadi in many of the foreign markets it operates. It has been banned from operating in parts of France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium. It has been accused of willfully ignoring and breaking the law, placing both drivers and riders in peril. And its presence in various countries has generated an incredible backlash – protests, riots, clashes with angry labor unions, and an endless litany of customer complaints.

So how could Uber have avoided this mess? First, the young, talented, and well-endowed company should have recognized that China, India, and Europe, though rife with economic potential, differ in meaningful ways from the US. It should have taken a careful look at its practices and policies to consider whether they were appropriate to each specific country. Uber would have fared better asking for permission to operate from the proper authorities and thus conveying its respect for established regulations and institutions, no matter how time consuming it may seem. It also should have invested time in building relationships with the various unions that represent taxi drivers rather than foment hostile reactions with aggressive entry tactics. Harnessing a cooperative approach that aims to anticipate country-specific risks would have helped Uber avoid much of the political – and popular – backlash it received. It would have helped curry cultural favor with the local consumer base. And it would have helped make Uber a more formidable competitor in the local market.

Although the headline was about Uber’s China problem, Uber’s global problems extend well beyond China. Moreover, the tale of Uber is one that is not uncommon for globalizing companies, big or small, new economy or old. And it highlights how important it is, now more than ever, to understand the political, cultural, and economic environments in the global marketplace and to tailor business strategies accordingly.

Robert Salomon is an associate professor of international management at NYU Stern School of Business and author of Global Vision: How Companies Can Overcome the Pitfalls of Globalization.