亞馬遜最好用的選品工具

Rackspace, the cloud services firm that first listed in 2008, and was then taken private by private equity goliath Apollo Global, returned to the public markets earlier this month, only to be received with a collective shrug. Unlike other recent public entrants like Lemonade and Vroom, which doubled on their first days of trading, Rackspace (RXT)’s debut on the Nasdaq saw its shares slump by 22%.

R ackspace是一家云服務公司， 于2008年首次上市，然后被私募股權巨人Apollo Global私有化，本月初重返公開市場，但遭到了聳聳肩的歡迎。 不像Lemonade和Vroom等其他最近的公眾進入者在交易的第一天就翻了一番，Rackspace(RXT)在納斯達克的首次亮相使其股價下跌了22％ 。

Earlier this week, however, Rackspace’s shares rose as reports surfaced that Amazon is considering scooping up a minority stake in the company.

然而，本周早些時候，由于有報道稱亞馬遜正在考慮收購該公司的少數股權，Rackspace的股票上漲。

As Jeff Bezos and Co. look to take advantage of the depressed price of 2020’s worst IPO, it’s worth asking why retail investors have been so uninterested in the company. Here are four reasons Rackspace may have received cool reception amidst so much heat (and one reason why Amazon may want a piece of it).

杰夫·貝佐( Jeff Bezo s)和公司(Co.)希望利用2020年最糟糕 IPO的低迷價格，因此值得一提的是，為什么散戶投資者對公司如此不感興趣。 這是Rackspace可能在這么多熱量中獲得冷淡接待的四個原因(這也是Amazon可能想要一部分熱量的一個原因)。

錯過炒作火車 (Missing the hype train)

Whether true or not, this IPO season has been defined by one dominant narrative: Buy-happy Robinhood investors are spamming the market with purchase orders for anything with the whiff of high-growth. Among others, that narrative has been used to explain the breakouts of Vroom and Lemonade, two lightly “tech-enabled” IPOs.

不管是真的不是真的 ，這個IPO季都是由一個占主導地位的敘述來定義的：樂于買進的Robinhood投資者正以高增長的欲望向購買任何東西的訂單發送垃圾郵件。 除其他外，該敘述已被用來解釋Vroom和Lemonade的突破，這是兩家輕度“以技術為動力”的IPO。

If there is an active cohort of investors trading off of buzz, that could explain part of the reason Rackspace stalled out of the gate. Though the company has made an effort to emphasize their technical bona fides by tacking on “Technologies” to the end of their name, “Rackspace” is a moniker that feels old. As the conversation has shifted to the cloud, the very notion of server “racks” sounds outdated. In other words, in a volatile market trading off of hype, Rackspace is unlikely to get the heart racing.

如果有投資者議論交易掉的活躍群體，這可以解釋的Rackspace公司停滯不前的門出來的部分原因。 雖然該公司已作出了努力，通過“技術”黏合到他們的名字的結尾來強調自己的技術善意，“Rackspace公司”是舊的感覺一個綽號。 隨著對話轉移到云上，服務器“機架”的概念聽起來已經過時了。 換句話說，在一個動蕩不定的市場中，Rackspace不太可能引起轟動。

新焦點 (A new focus)

More tangibly, investors may have less interest in Rackspace’s new direction.

更具體地說，投資者可能對Rackspace的新方向興趣減少。

Since purchasing the company in 2016, Apollo has redirected Rackspace to focus on the lower-margin, but less competitive cloud services business instead of cloud computing. That means that rather than providing on-demand storage and computing power as Rackspace once did, the company is now focused on helping other businesses set up and manage their own cloud environments. The company’s 6,800 employees, known as “Rackers,” service 120,000 customers across 120 countries.

自2016年收購該公司以來，Apollo已將Rackspace重定向至專注于利潤率較低，但競爭力較低的云服務業務，而不是云計算。 這意味著該公司不再像Rackspace那樣提供按需存儲和計算功能，而是專注于幫助其他企業建立和管理自己的云環境。 該公司擁有6,800名員工，被稱為“機架”，為120個國家/地區的120,000名客戶提供服務。

While it makes sense that Apollo has initiated this change given the competition in the hosting space (more on this below), it may be a less enticing proposition for investors. Rackspace’s service business is lower margin, for one thing. Though still reasonable at 40%, it represents a hit from the previous 50% margins commanded by Rackspace’s cloud computing offering. It’s also a fundamentally less scalable product — while the company’s S-1 (discussed in-depth here) talked up Rackspace’s internal technology that helps automate different tasks, ultimately, its growth will require considerable human capital.

考慮到托管空間的競爭，雖然阿波羅已經發起了這一變革(在下文有更多介紹)，但對于投資者而言，這可能是一個不太誘人的主張。 一方面，Rackspace的服務業務利潤較低。 盡管仍然合理(40％)，但它比Rackspace的云計算產品所要求的之前50％的利潤率有所下降。 它也是一種根本上可擴展性較差的產品，而該公司的S-1( 在此進行了深入討論 )談論了Rackspace的內部技術，該技術可幫助自動完成不同的任務，最終，其增長將需要大量的人力資本。

強大的幽靈 (Formidable specters)

Rackspace’s management has taken great pains to emphasize they no longer compete with Amazon, or the other cloud computing goliaths.

Rackspace的管理層竭力強調他們不再與Amazon或其他云計算巨頭競爭。

“Now, they’re our biggest partner,” CEO Kevin Jones said in an interview, referring to Amazon Web Services. “We look at them as our sales team and research and development team.”

“現在，他們是我們最大的合作伙伴，”首席執行官凱文·瓊斯(Kevin Jones)在接受采訪時說 ，指的是Amazon Web Services。 “我們將他們視為我們的銷售團隊和研發團隊。”

While that’s a sensible argument to advance, investors may still be spooked. Technically, Rackspace still competes with AWS through its withering cloud computing division. And if AWS or other market leaders wish to push into services more aggressively — either through building or buying — Rackspace would be a much less attractive business. In that respect, there’s not a great deal that feels defensible about the company, particularly when brushing shoulders with some of the world’s most omnivorous businesses.

盡管這是前進的明智論據，但投資者可能仍會受到驚嚇。 從技術上講，Rackspace仍通過其枯竭的云計算部門與AWS競爭。 而且，如果AWS或其他市場領導者希望通過構建或購買來更積極地推廣服務，Rackspace的業務吸引力將大大降低。 在這方面，對于公司而言，沒有什么值得辯護的地方，尤其是當與世界上一些最雜食無味的公司擦肩而過時。

債務和更多債務 (Debt and more debt)

Every balance sheet tells a story. Rackspace’s reveals the tale of a classic private equity play, showcasing the asset class’s signature move: debt. When Apollo completed a leveraged buyout of the cloud company in 2016, they saddled Rackspace with about $4 billion of debt. That remains on the company’s books today. Rackspace’s debt to equity sits at 5.9x, considerably more than comparable cloud servicers like Infosys (0.06x) or Cognizant (0.32x).

每個資產負債表都講述一個故事。 Rackspace的影片揭示了經典私募股權交易的故事，展示了資產類別的標志性舉動：債務。 當阿波羅在2016年完成對云公司的杠桿收購時，他們使Rackspace背負了約40億美元的債務。 如今，這仍然存在于該公司的賬簿中。 Rackspace的權益負債率為5.9倍，比Infosys(0.06倍)或Cognizant(0.32倍)之類的云服務提供商高得多。

While that’s not an existential threat at the moment, debt adds risk to a business. While Rackspace is able to reduce operational cost in other ways if it needs to — cutting staff, or driving down COGS — it will still be on the hook for interest payments. There’s a reason that companies that go private through leveraged buyouts are 10 times more likely to file for bankruptcy. Investors may consequently prefer to park their capital elsewhere.

雖然目前這還不是生存威脅，但債務增加了業務風險。 盡管Rackspace可以在需要時(例如裁員或降低COGS)以其他方式降低運營成本，但仍將需要支付利息。 有理由認為，通過杠桿收購進行私有化的公司申請破產的可能性要高10倍。 因此，投資者可能更愿意將資金存放在其他地方。

亞馬遜的市場地位下滑 (Amazon’s sliding market position)

Since launching in 2006, AWS has held a firm grasp on the cloud computing market. Even 14 years later, the Amazon division has 32.4% of the market, compared to Microsoft Azure’s 17.6% and Google Cloud’s 6%. Alibaba Cloud lags at 5.4%. While impressive, there are signs that dominance is waning. Amazon’s share is down 1% in the last year, while it’s competitors have all grown. Perhaps more worryingly, AWS is on a slower growth trajectory than insurgents. Annual growth is pegged at 33.2% while Azure and Google Cloud both top 60%. The battle for the cloud is likely to intensify in the years ahead.

自2006年推出以來，AWS牢牢把握了云計算市場。 甚至14年后，亞馬遜部門仍占有32.4％的市場份額，而微軟Azure的市場份額為17.6％，谷歌云的市場份額為6％。 阿里云落后5.4％。 盡管令人印象深刻，但有跡象表明主導地位正在減弱。 去年，亞馬遜的份額下降了1％，而競爭對手都在增長。 也許更令人擔憂的是，AWS的增長軌跡要比叛亂分子慢。 年增長率預計為33.2％，而Azure和Google Cloud均排名前60％。 未來幾年，云之戰可能會加劇。

With that mind, forging a closer alliance with Rackspace makes sense. As cloud computing platforms potentially converge, service may take on added importance. If that proves to be the case, tight integrations with providers like Rackspace could be beneficial. Theoretically, Amazon should be able to improve their own offering by providing better service, while the investment would also set the stage for an outright acquisition of Rackspace down the line.

有這樣的想法，與Rackspace建立更緊密的聯盟是有道理的。 隨著云計算平臺的潛在融合，服務可能會變得更加重要。 如果事實證明如此，那么與Rackspace這樣的提供商進行緊密集成可能會有所幫助。 從理論上講，亞馬遜應該能夠通過提供更好的服務來改善自己的產品，同時這項投資也將為直接收購Rackspace奠定基礎。

Ultimately, this deal would be an example of Amazon playing both offense and defense: bulking up their current product, and reducing the likelihood of a competitor snapping up Rackspace.

最終，這筆交易將成為亞馬遜在進攻和防守兩方面都發揮作用的一個例子：擴大他們目前的產品，并減少競爭對手搶購Rackspace的可能性。

We’re unlikely to know the upshot of Amazon’s interest in Rackspace this summer with reports suggesting a deal could take up to two months to negotiate. By that point, we may have a clearer picture of how the market views the company that cloud computing forgot, and a better understanding of whether they will keep their place in the public markets in the years ahead.

我們不太可能知道今年夏天亞馬遜對Rackspace感興趣的結果，有報道稱一項交易可能需要長達兩個月的談判時間。 到那時，我們可能對市場如何看待云計算遺忘的公司有了更清晰的了解，并且對它們是否會在未來幾年保持在公開市場的位置有了更好的了解。

翻譯自: https://marker.medium.com/why-amazon-wants-to-invest-in-the-worst-ipo-of-2020-6db9725891b2

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