经济学人下载:民用航空发动机 奋力一战

Business
商业报道

Civilian jet engines
民用航空发动机

Gearing up for a fight
奋力一战

Pratt & Whitney hopes a high-tech engine will restore its former dominance.
普拉特·惠特尼公司期待其新款的高科技航空发动机能重塑往日的统治力。

A challenger in the air
空中的挑战者

THE business of propelling large passenger jets is at maximum thrust.
大型载客飞机的业务正以史无前例的速度在发展。

Boeing and Airbus delivered a record 1,300 planes between them last year.
波音和空客在去年相继打破1,300架飞机的纪录。

They also racked up 2,800 new orders to bring their combined backlog to well over 10,000.
它们还赢得了2,800架飞机的新订单，从而使它们的共同未完成订单数冲破了10,000。

The engines account for up to a third of the value of a new jet.
由于飞机发动机的价值为整个飞机的三分之一，

So some pundits reckon engine-makers' revenues could total 1 trillion over the next 20 years.
不少权威人士认定发动机制造商的利润总和会在未来20年内达到1万亿。

Pratt & Whitney used to tower over the market for such engines but these days it is third-placed in a business dominated by GE, another American company, and Rolls-Royce, of Britain. Pratt is now hoping to claw its way back to the top with its new generation of jet engine, the geared turbofan.
普惠公司曾在飞机发动机市场独占鳌头，然而今年来它已经跌到了第三位：该业务的头两位是同为美国公司的通用电气和英国的劳斯莱斯。

This has a gearbox that lets the fan at the front of the engine turn at a different speed to the compressors inside it.
普惠现在希望借助其新一代飞机发动机—齿轮传动涡轮发动机重夺市场。

By allowing each to run at optimal speeds it makes the engine more efficient.
该款发动机的变速齿轮箱可以使发动机前端的风扇根据内部的压缩机改变速度，从而能通过使发动机以最优速度运转来提高效率。

Pratt's new engine is one of the options airlines can choose when ordering Airbus's revamped version of its A320 narrowbody jet, used for short- to medium-haul routes.
各航线在订购空客公司用于中短程线路的改进版A320窄体客机时，普惠的新型发动机是其选择之一。

It is the only choice on the CSeries, a jet whose Canadian maker, Bombardier, is seeking to bust a duopoly between Airbus and Boeing for narrowbodies.
而Bombardier—一家想在窄体机上打破空客和波音双头垄断的加拿大飞机制造商—旗下的C系列机型全部采用了这款发动机。

But the CSeries's entry into service was this month put back until perhaps 2015, two years later than first planned.
但C系列服役的时间在本月被推迟了，而且可能要一直等到2015年，这比原来计划的要晚上两年。

Understanding the aero-engine business is made harder by the fact that as they compete ferociously in one part of the market, manufacturers work together in joint ventures in other parts.
制作商一方面在局部市场上激烈竞争一方面又在另一部分市场上相互合作的事实使人很难理解航空发动机业务。

In all, about 70% of the world's jetliner engines are made either by GE alone or by CFM International, GE's joint venture with Snecma of France.
世界上所有喷气客机的发动机中70%是由通用电气或者CFM国际制造的。

CFM supplies all the engines for Boeing's 737, its rival to the A320.
CFM为波音旗下和A320竞争的另一款机型737提供发动机。

Buyers of A320s can currently choose between a CFM engine or one from International Aero Engines, a consortium including Pratt and Japanese and German firms.
如今，A320的购买者也可以在CFM和国际航空发动的发动机之间做出选择。

For bigger widebody jets, Rolls and GE are the main contenders.
而大型的广体飞机的主要供应商则是劳斯莱斯和通用电气。

Rivalry was more intense in the past.
在过去，竞争要更为激烈。

But the cost of developing a new engine, at around 1 billion, resulted in today's odd mix of competition and collaboration.
但是研发新型发动机所需的大约10亿美元高额费用造成了今天这种竞争和合作共存的怪异局面。

Airlines prefer competition, to keep costs down, but there are some advantages to doing without it.
各大航线乐于看到这种竞争，它能降低价格。但是如果没有这种竞争也能带来一些好处。

It means the plane and engine are made for each other, optimising their performance.
比如，这意味着飞机和发动机将会相互订制，从而使性能达到最佳。

An engine-maker guaranteed exclusivity may contribute towards the development costs of a new plane, cutting the risks borne by the planemakers.
一家专门的发动机供应商可以为降低新型飞机的研发费用做出贡献，减少飞机制造商们的负担。

Pratt has got by for years on its military-jet engines, its slice of IAE and by milking its installed base of older civil-aircraft engines, which need lots of maintenance and spare parts.
今年来普惠主要依靠军用飞机发动机，IAE的股份以及旧款民用航空发动机来维持运营，然而这些发动机需要更多的维修和零部件。

But from 2016, when the first revamped A320 is scheduled for delivery, its new geared turbofan engines, which it will make all by itself, will go head-to-head against CFM's LEAP.
而等到2016年改进版的A320按计划开始服役，普惠独立制造的齿轮传动涡轮发动机将能够和CFM的LEAP发动机齐头并进。

This is a more conventional engine design, but uses sophisticated composite materials to achieve the same fuel-efficiency savings, of around 15%, that airlines are demanding.
该款发动机的设计更为传统，但采用了组分更为复杂的材料来提高效率，能够节省航空公司要求的15%的燃料。

Pratt may eventually produce versions of its geared turbofan for wide-bodied jets, where profits are fatter.
普惠最终甚至会研发用于广体飞机的齿轮传动涡轮发动机，这一类发动机的利润要高得多。

Rolls, having given up on the narrowbodied market, plans to return when Boeing and Airbus replace their 737s and A320s with entirely new models—but that is a decade or more away.
已经放弃窄体机市场的劳斯莱斯计划在波音和空客用全新的机型替代737和A320后重返该市场，不过这要十多年后了。

Chinese and Russian firms want to enter the fray, though that may take even longer.
中国和俄罗斯的公司也想分一杯羹，当然这需要更长的时间。

In the meantime, Rob Morris of Ascend, an aviation consultancy, notes that the tendency towards having just one engine option per plane is growing.
与此同时，航空咨询公司超越集团的Rob Morris提到各飞机只搭配一款发动机的趋势逐渐流行。

For example, Rolls is the only engine supplier for Airbus's new long-haul plane, the A350, which had its first test flight last year.
比如，空客的新型长途飞机A350就只有劳斯莱斯一个发动机供应商，该款机型已经在去年初次试飞。

GE declined to offer an engine because some variants of the A350 are in direct competition with Boeing's 777, on which GE already supplies all the engines.
通用电气拒绝提供发动机的原因是A350的一些变体机种是波音777的直接竞争对手，而777的所以发动机均由通用电气提供。

Rolls and GE at least both offer engines for Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, which will compete with other variants of the A350.
劳斯莱斯和通用电气至少同时为与其他A350变体机竞争的波音787梦幻客机提供发动机。

So a return to vigorous competition among three or more engine-makers is far from guaranteed.
因而未必能回到三家甚至更多引擎制造商激烈竞争的局面。

Indeed, Zafar Khan of Societe Generale, a bank, suggests that since Rolls is relatively small and Pratt is part of a deep-pocketed conglomerate, United Technologies, Pratt might contemplate bidding for Rolls to ensure its return to the widebodied market.
法国兴业银行的Zafar Khan表示鉴于劳斯莱斯相对规模较小，而普惠公司隶属于财力雄厚的企业集团联合科技，普惠可能会考虑出资买下劳斯莱斯来保证进入广体机业务。

That would require the agreement of the British government, which has a golden share in Rolls.
这需要得到有着劳斯莱斯黄金股份的英国政府的许可。

But if such a deal also ensured Rolls's long-term future, that might not be impossible.
不过如果这真的利于劳斯莱斯的长期未来，也并非没有可能。