中國企業開拓以色列市場受歡迎
When Israel held its biggest agricultural technology conference, Agrivest, last month, one in 10 of the delegates who travelled to the central city of Rehovot to attend came from China.
當以色列上月舉行該國規模最大的農業技術會議Agrivest時，前往中部城市雷霍沃特(Rehovot)與會的代表有十分之一來自中國。A few weeks before, a large delegation from Alibaba the Chinese ecommerce heavyweight, had been in Tel Aviv to attend Cybertech, Israel’s main conference on cyber security, an area in which the security-conscious Jewish state excels. Alibaba in January invested a sum in Visualead, an Israeli group specialising in QR code technology.
那場會議的幾周前，中國電商巨擘阿里巴巴(Alibaba)的一個大型代表團抵達特拉維夫，出席以色列主要的網絡安全會議Cybertech——這個安全意識較強的猶太國家在該領域相當拿手。今年1月，阿里巴巴曾對專業從事二維碼技術的以色列Visualead集團作出一筆投資。
Chinese companies are pushing deeper and further into Israel than ever before, and Israeli companies and government officials are returning the embrace. “There seems to be a kosher stamp from the government on both sides to let these trade relations blossom and bloom,” says Jon Medved, founder and chief executive of OurCrowd, the Israeli crowdfunding company.
中國企業正以前所未有的深度和廣度進軍以色列，而以色列企業和政府官員張開雙臂歡迎。“貌似兩國政府加蓋了一個‘猶太戳印’，讓這些貿易關係開花結果，”以色列衆籌公司OurCrowd創始人和首席執行官喬恩•米德維(Jon Medved)表示。
A decade ago, Chinese overseas investment was primarily focused on securing supplies of natural resources in places such as Africa and Latin America, and was driven by state-owned energy and mining companies.
10年前，中國對外投資的主要焦點是在非洲和拉丁美洲等地獲取自然資源供應，而且是由國有能源和礦業公司推動的。Now the huge surge of outbound investment is increasingly targeting brands and technology that China lacks in its home market, with private as well as state companies paying out cash. China’s outbound investment is expected to exceed incoming foreign investment, which totalled about $128bn in 2014, for the first time later this year.
如今大幅增長的對外投資日趨瞄準中國本土市場欠缺的品牌和技術，而掏錢投資的既有國企，也有民營企業。預計今年中國對外投資將首次超過外商對華投資，後者在2014年共計約1280億美元。“The interest stems from a clear strategic objective of China, and that is to become a power not only in copying and doing what others do — but more cheaply — but in coming on to the list of investors itself,” says Oded Eran, who runs the China forum at Tel Aviv’s Institute of National Security Studies.
“這種興趣源自中國的一個明確戰略目標，那就是不僅要做一個擅長以更低成本仿製別人產品的強國，更要躋身於投資者行列，”在特拉維夫的國家安全研究所(Institute of National Security Studies)執掌“中國論壇”的奧德•葉蘭(Oded Eran)表示。China’s Bright Food recently won official approval from its own government to buy control of Tnuva, Israel’s biggest dairy company, from the private equity firm Apax Partners in a deal that values the target at $2bn.
中國的光明食品(Bright Food)最近獲得本國政府正式批准，從私募股權投資公司Apax Partners手中收購以色列最大乳品公司Tnuva的控股權，這筆交易對收購目標的估值達到20億美元。The Chinese are eating more cheese than ever before. However, the company has said that it was investing in Tnuva because “Israel is well known for its agriculture and the quality of its agricultural management”.
如今中國的奶酪消費量達到空前水平。不過，光明食品表示，其投資Tnuva是因爲“以色列以農業和高質量的農業管理聞名”。The deal was the biggest Chinese buyout of an Israeli group since 2011, when China National Chemical Corporation bought Adama, the pesticides and crop protection company then known as Makhteshim Agan, for $2.4bn.
這是自2011年以來中資收購以色列集團的最大交易。2011年中國化工集團(ChemChina)斥資24億美元收購以色列殺蟲劑和農作物保護企業Adama，後者當時稱爲馬克西姆-阿甘(Makhteshim Agan)。Chinese money has arrived in Israel only recently, and so far it has run into relatively little political backlash, even on critical infrastructure projects such as the new 3.3bn shekel ($863m) port being built in the Mediterranean city of Ashdod, by contractor China Harbor.
中資只是在近年才進軍以色列，迄今遭遇相對較少的政治阻力，即使在關鍵的基礎設施項目上也是如此，比如由中國港灣工程公司(China Harbor)在地中海城市阿什杜德(Ashdod)承建的33億謝克爾（合8.63億美元）新港口。
