ECONOMICS REPORT - Microsoft, the EU and Facebook
Thu, 25 Oct 2007
This is the VOA Special English Economics Report.
经济报道――微软、欧盟及Facebook公司。
2007年10月25日星期四。
这是VOA特别英语经济报道。
This week, Microsoft agreed to end its fight against European Union competition officials. The world's largest software company withdrew its remaining appeals at a European court.
Microsoft has faced record European Union fines and may still owe more. But it says it wants to put its energies into meeting its legal duties and strengthening its relationship with the European Commission.
本周，微软同意结束其与欧盟竞争（委员会）官员的抗争。世界最大的软件公司撤回了在欧洲法庭的未决上诉。
微软业已面临欧盟创纪录的罚款，并还可能面临更多罚款。但微软说，准备将其精力用于履行其法律义务，并加强与欧盟委员会的关系。
In two thousand four, the commission ordered Microsoft to share information with competitors. This information would help them develop software for server computers to "interoperate," or work easily, with Windows.
Windows is the Microsoft operating system found on more than ninety percent of personal computers. The company argued that it needed to protect trade secrets.
在2004年，欧盟委员会命令微软与其竞争对手分享信息。该信息将有助于竞争对手开发软件，这一软件使服务器计算机与（微软）视窗更容易协同操作或工作。
视窗是微软的操作系统，用于90%以上的个人电脑。微软抗辩说，需要保护其商业秘密。
But now, Microsoft has agreed to share secret information with developers for a one-time payment of ten thousand euros. That is about fourteen thousand dollars at current exchange rates.
Microsoft also wanted to charge competitors almost six percent of the sales from products that use its information. But in the end it agreed to charge less than half a percent for worldwide use.
但是现在，微软同意，以一次性1万欧元付款的方式与（软件）开发商分享保密信息。在目前的汇率条件下，这一付款相当于大约1.4万美元。
微软也想向竞争对手收取使用该等信息的产品销售额的几乎6%，但最后，微软同意只收取允许其全球使用的0.5%不到。
The European Union began to investigate Microsoft in nineteen ninety-eight after Sun Microsystems accused the company of being anti-competitive. Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, fought back. But last month, it lost a big ruling. The second-highest court in the European Union agreed that Microsoft abused its market position.
In a separate case, Microsoft decided last week not to appeal a thirty-four million dollar fine by the Fair Trade Commission in South Korea.
在太阳计算机系统控告微软违反竞争之后，欧盟于1998年开始调查微软公司。总部位于华盛顿州雷德蒙市的微软开始反击。但是，微软在上个月输了一起大官司（裁决）。欧盟第二高等法院裁定，微软滥用了其市场地位。
在另一起案件中，微软上周决定，不再对韩国公平贸易委员会（裁决的）3400万美元罚款提起上诉。
But Microsoft could at least claim a victory in one of its efforts to expand its Internet business. This week it won the right to invest in Facebook and to expand an advertising partnership with the social networking site. Facebook chose Microsoft over Google, the leading Internet search company.
但是，微软至少可以说有一项胜利，即可扩展其网络业务。本周，微软赢得了投资Facebook公司的权利，以及扩展社会网络的广告合作伙伴的权利。Facebook公司选择了微软，而不是网络搜索领袖谷歌。
Microsoft will invest two hundred forty million dollars to buy a one and one-half percent interest. Microsoft values Facebook at fifteen billion dollars. Facebook reportedly expects about one hundred fifty million dollars in revenue this year. The company will be four years old in February and says the site has almost fifty million active users.
微软将投资2.4亿美元，购买1.5%的股权。微软将Facebook公司估值为150美元。据报道，Facebook公司今年预计有1.5亿收益。到二月，Facebook公司将四岁，并报道说，该网站几乎有5000万实际使用的用户。
And that's the VOA Special English Economics Report, written by Mario Ritter. Our reports are online with transcripts at www.unsv.com. I'm Jim Tedder.
这是由Mario Ritter编写的VOA特别英语的经济报道。我们的报道文稿，请参见www.unsv.com；我是Jim Tedder。