????驅(qū)動因素之三：市場廣闊

????如今的高科技公司瞄準(zhǔn)的是巨大的市場，它們的規(guī)模令前幾代科技公司相形見絀。簡而言之，如今成功科技公司的前景比過去要廣闊得多，因為它們面對的終端用戶市場極為廣闊。

????原因何在？我的合伙人馬克?安德森經(jīng)常提到的數(shù)據(jù)很能說明問題。安德森1998年將自己創(chuàng)辦的網(wǎng)景公司（Netscape）出售給了美國在線（AOL）。彼時，瀏覽器市場的用戶總數(shù)約5500萬，幾乎所有人都是通過撥號上網(wǎng)。

????而如今，隨著寬帶的普及以及智能手機和平板電腦的發(fā)展，有25億人幾乎隨時都能聯(lián)網(wǎng)。而且這個人數(shù)很快將超過50億。

????這樣看來，1999至2000年泡沫期間的互聯(lián)網(wǎng)公司紛紛倒閉也就不足為奇了。說到底，這些公司面向的市場太小了，而獲取新用戶以及為新用戶提供技術(shù)基礎(chǔ)設(shè)施的成本過高（還記得那會兒Sun公司售價高達(dá)5萬美元的服務(wù)器么？）。

????相比之下，如今不僅終端用戶市場要大得多，而且支撐這些市場所需的技術(shù)成本要低得多【比如亞馬遜網(wǎng)絡(luò)服務(wù)（Amazon Web Services）、開源軟件組件等】。規(guī)模經(jīng)濟終于發(fā)揮效力了。

????當(dāng)然，不是每家在大學(xué)宿舍中搗鼓出的高科技公司都能像Facebook那樣大獲成功。也不是說風(fēng)險投資家和公眾投資者不可能失去理智，盲目地將所有網(wǎng)絡(luò)公司的市盈率都炒到15到20倍。

????泡沫當(dāng)然有可能出現(xiàn)。但現(xiàn)在還沒有。（財富中文網(wǎng)）

????本文作者斯考特?庫柏是安德森?霍洛維茨風(fēng)投公司的管理合伙人兼首席營運官。這家公司致力于投資科技行業(yè)。此前，斯考特?庫柏曾在惠普擔(dān)任副總裁，全面負(fù)責(zé)全球客戶支持及軟件即服務(wù)部門。

????譯者：項航

????Driver No. 3: These are massive markets

????Today's technology companies are going after massive markets, the value of which dwarfs that of previous generations of tech companies. Simply put, the winners in tech today can become massively larger than the winners of yesteryear because the end-user markets into which they can sell are enormous.

????Why is that? My partner, Marc Andreessen, likes to recount a simple stat that sums it up quite nicely. When his company Netscape was sold to AOL (AOL) in 1998, the total size of the browser market was roughly 55 million users, nearly all were accessing the Internet via those ear-screeching dial-up connections.

????Fast-forward to today, largely as a result of broadband penetration and the growth of smartphones and tablets, and there are 2.5 billion people with virtually ubiquitous Internet access. And that number is likely to exceed 5 billion in short order.

????Is it really any wonder then why so many of the 1999-2000 bubble-era Internet companies failed? The markets into which they were selling were simply too small compared with both the costs of acquiring customers and the costs of the technology infrastructure (remember that $50,000 box called a Sun server?) required to support these customers.

????By contrast, not only are the end-user markets today vastly bigger, but the technology costs required to support these markets (think Amazon Web Services (AMZN), open source software components, etc … ) have plummeted. The economics finally work.

????This isn't to say that every new technology company being incubated at a university dorm will achieve the success and scale of Facebook. Nor is it to say that venture capitalists and public investors may not ultimately lose their minds and blindly pay 15 to 20 times revenue multiples for any dotcom company.

????Bubbles can, of course, happen. But we simply aren't there yet.

????Scott Kupor is the managing partner and chief operating officer at Andreessen Horowitz, which focuses all its investments in the technology industry. Previously, he was VP/GM of Global Customer Support & Software-as-a-Service at Hewlett Packard.