GRE精选课外阅读文章 时尚单品与科技的优雅融合

Why Burberry's boss is a perfect fit for Apple.AMONG stewards of big luxury brands Angela Ahrendts, the boss of Burberry, is probably the geekiest.Her main achievement has been to make the 150-year-old British company the most technologically savvy of its peers.Burberry plans to be the first luxury company that is fully digital end to end, she boasts.But what can she do for Apple, which on October 14th said it would poach her to run its retailing operations?

Burberry老板与苹果如此合拍，秘密何在?Burberry的老板Angela Ahrendts可能是所有的大型奢侈品牌管理者中最不招人喜欢的。他的主要成就就是使这所150年历史的英国老牌企业成为同行中的技术型企业。她夸口说Burberry计划成为第一家完全数字化的奢侈品企业。但是苹果于10月14日宣称会插手她的零售业务，对此她又能有什么办法呢?

Probably the opposite: revive a sense of style at a tech firm that has lately looked a bit dowdy.Many purveyors of luxury fret about cheapening their wares by selling them online.Of the 100 biggest luxury brands just 56 have transactional websites, according to Exane BNP Paribas, an investment bank.Ms Ahrendts, an American who took over Burberry in 2006, had no such hangups.

也许相反，在一家科技公司恢复一种风格有点过时。很多奢侈品供应商担心在网上销售会降低商品价格。据Exane BNP Paribas ，一家投资银行称100家顶级奢侈品牌中只有56家有网上交易平台。Ahrendts女士，这位于06年接管Burberry的美国人不这么认为。

这篇阅读材料还有MP3音频哦!下载>>传送门

Not content with flogging calfskin trench coats online, she has deployed every platform, device or bit of software she could think of to romance customers and spark collaboration among employees and suppliers.iPad-wielding salespeople in Burberry stores can look up what customers have already bought, and suggest what might take their fancy next.

不满足于仅在网上出售皮制品，她已在各个平台全面铺开，用所能想到的一切设备吸引顾客，希望与顾客擦出火花。Burberry的店员手持IPAD随时记录顾客的购买信息，并预测他们的可能喜好。

Ms Ahrendts should add pizzazz to Apple's bricks-and-mortar shops, which are the most profitable in America measured by sales per square foot.But that seems a small job for a woman who last year was the highest-paid chief executive of a company in the FTSE 100 share index.At Apple, from next spring, she will merely be a senior vice-president.

Ahrendts。应该投入更多精力在美国每季度盈利最多的苹果实体店上。但对于一个进入去年福布斯百位收入最高企业高管的女士而言，这似乎是小事一桩。至于苹果，从下个春季开始她就仅仅是一个部门副主席。

So the odds are that her brief will go well beyond managing Apple's stores. She can help it crack the Chinese market, where its iPhones are also-rans in the race against cheaper smartphones from Samsung and local manufacturers.Burberry earns more than a third of its revenue in Asia compared with Apple's 28%.A bigger job will be to ready Apple for the coming fusion of fashion and technology.

所以很有可能她的表现会比在苹果时更好。她能帮助苹果打开竞争激烈的中国市场，这竞争来自于三星和中国国产智能机对IPHONE的竞争。较苹果的28%，Burberry的亚洲市场盈利超过其总盈利的1/3。苹果已经准备好了面对即将到来的时尚与科技融合的浪潮。

The most talked-about new devices are wearable.Google's Glass smuggles a smartphone into a pair of spectacles.Samsung's Galaxy Gear squeezes some smartphone functions into a wristwatch.Apple is also keen to surf the wearable wave.An iWatch, which Apple may launch next year, would pull it towards Ms Ahrendts's home turf, since it would compete with fashionable timepieces like Burberry's.

更多双语文章》》 点击这里

现在被广泛谈及的新设备都是可戴式的。谷歌眼镜将智能机植入眼镜。三星是能表将智能手机与手表融合。苹果也想赶上这一穿戴式科技浪潮。苹果可能会明年推出iWatch，鉴于可能与时尚腕表比如Burberry展开竞争，他可能会推向Ahrendts's女士的主场。

Apple has long been something of a fashion house.Its product launches are choreographed like catwalk shows.But its glamour has faded since the death of Steve Jobs, its founder, in 2011.His successor, Tim Cook, is striving to regain it.He recently hired Paul Deneve, the boss of Yves Saint Laurent, a French fashion house.Sir Jony Ive, Apple's design guru, now oversees the look of software as well as hardware. Ms Ahrendts brings another eye for beauty, and a knack for seducing consumers.

苹果现在已成为时尚工厂。他的项目都是精心设计的就像时装秀一样。但是自从创始人乔布斯在2011年死后他的魅力正在逐渐削减。而继任者Tim Cook则在努力重获魅力。最近他雇了法国时尚工厂Yves Saint Laurent的老板Paul Deneve。Jony Ive苹果首席设计师如今不仅要负责软件也要负责硬件外观。Ms Ahrendts则从另一个角度带来美，吸引顾客。

每天更新

想看下一期精选双语阅读文章？ 戳这里>>不要自己吓自己 相信自己身体很棒