VOA慢速英語:Amazon Launches Its First Shopping Website in India

From VOA Learning English, this is the Technology Report.

這里是美國之音慢速英語科技報道。

The world's largest online retailer company, Amazon has launched its first shopping website in India. The company hopes to make use of India's economic growth to expand its online business.

全球最大的網絡零售商亞馬遜公司在印度推出了其首個購物網站。該公司希望利用印度的經濟增長擴大其網上業務。

The amazon website in India offers seven million books and 12,000 movies and television programs. It plans to add more products in the coming weeks. The American company will not sell its own products in India, Indian laws ban companies that carry goods from more than one manufacture from selling directly to people on the Internet. Instead the amazon website serves as a marketplace for local businesses.

亞馬遜印度網站提供700萬冊圖書和12000份電影電視節目，并計劃在未來數周內加入更多產品。這家美國公司不會在印度銷售自己的產品。印度法律禁止從多家工廠進貨的公司在互聯網上直接向客戶銷售。相反，亞馬遜網站將作為本地企業的市場。

Shabori Das is with the market research company Euromonitor. She predicts the online shopping in India will experience a yearly growth of nearly 17 percent in the next five years.

Shabori Das就職于歐睿(Euromonitor)市場研究公司。她預測在未來五年，印度網上購物將實現近17%的年增長。

"This makes India among the top 20 fastest growing Internet retailing markets in the world."

她說，“這將使得印度進入全球網上零售市場增長最快的前20名之列。”

Online businesses are looking at India's huge young population, many of home live in cities. Only about 12 percent of Indians have connection to the Internet -- much less than in countries like China.

網上企業都著眼于印度居住在城市的龐大年輕人口。只有12%的印度人接入互聯網，遠遠低于中國等國家。

But with 150 million Internet users in India, its market is still the third largest in the world. And it is expected to grow greatly as more people get connected. These growing numbers have made business leaders hope for that online shopping in India will become a bigger part of total sells. Among them is Kunal Bahl of snapdeal.com.

但印度有1.5億互聯網用戶，它仍然是全球第三大市場。隨著更多人接入互聯網，印度的互聯網市場有望顯著增長。不斷增長的數字使得商業領袖寄希望于印度的網上購物在銷售總額中占有更大的份額。其中就包括snapdeal網站的Kunal Bahl。

"Right now, in India about point two to point five percent of total deal is basically happening digitally. However in developed markets like the U.S. that number is 10 percent. So we have head room to grow from point two to going up to at least 10 percent and even further because India does not have the kind of offline retail penetration that a country like America would have."

他說，“目前在印度，只有大約0.2%到0.5%的交易總額是數字化銷售。然而在美國等發達國家，這一數字是10%。所以我們有望從0.2%發展到至少10%甚至更多。因為印度不像美國等國家有各類線下銷售滲透。”

He notes that infrastructure issues like transportation can make it hard for retail businesses to succeed in large cities, and many products are just not available in smaller towns.

他指出，交通等基礎設施問題會使得零售企業在大城市很難成功。而許多產品在小城鎮買不著。

"Indian cities don't have like one downtown, which is the case in most Western cities. We have maybe 25 downtowns in New Delhi. These cities are large and cumbersome to traverse for shoppers. In Tier one cities hence people see online shopping as being convenient, whereas in Tier 2 cities and beyond it is just giving them access to their aspiration.. to own good things in life but do not have access through offline retail."

他說，“印度城市不像多數西方城市一樣只有一個商業區。印度新德里可能就有25個商業區。這些城市對遍歷購物者來說又大又笨重。在一線城市人們因此看到網上購物的便利，而在二線城市及其之外，網上購物為他們的愿望提供了渠道，去擁有生活中沒法通過線下零售獲得的好東西。”

However the path to big profits may not be easy for online retail businesses. Online retail adds up to to $10 billion at present, but a large amount is for air travel.

然而，對網上零售企業來說，獲得巨額利潤并不容易。目前網上零售總計100億美元，但其中大部分來自航空業。

Shabori Das at Euromonitor says most online stores are struggling to earn money. She says the competition to increase sells is only going to get tougher with the entry of companies like Amazon.

歐睿公司的Shabori Das表示，大多數網店都在艱難求生存。她說，隨著亞馬遜這樣的公司進入，增加銷售的競爭將愈發嚴峻。