重生 印度最大欺詐案受害者歸來

Three years after a devastating fraud, Satyam, a technology firm, is back

三年前，一場欺詐案驚世駭俗；三年後，技術公司薩蒂揚歸來

"DEAR Board Members, it is with deep regret and tremendous burden that I am carrying on my conscience that I would like to bring the following facts to your notice." Sent in January 2009, it was the sort of letter no company director wants to get. In it Ramalinga Raju, boss of Satyam—then India's fourth-biggest technology firm, with a glittering list of Western clients and a cabinet full of corporate-governance trophies-confessed he had cooked the books on an epic scale, while insisting he had not benefited personally.

"尊敬的董事會成員，我揣着良心通知你們以下事實，深表愧疚，負擔重大。" 2009年1月公司的董事長收到這封信，但他們卻寧願沒得到過。信中，薩蒂揚（印度第四大科技公司。該公司有一張引人奪目的西方客戶名單，以及一個祕密完整的公司治理的獎盃）老總拉瑪林伽•拉賈（Ramalinga Raju）坦言其曾做了大量的假賬，但卻堅稱他本人並沒有撈取任何好處。

Mr Raju was "the most perfect gentleman you could ever meet," says a former friend. He used a beguilingly simple trick, similar to that employed by fraudsters at Parmalat, an Italian firm that blew up in 2003. Bogus customer receipts were created. To make the balance-sheet match the juiced-up income statement, documents showing fictitious cash balances were cooked up too. Mr Raju organised the firm in self-contained silos so that no one else could put two and two together. Satyam's real profits and cash position, the letter admitted, were over 90% lower than the figures in the accounts. Within days its share price collapsed by about 90%.

"拉賈曾是你能遇到的最正直的君子，"一位舊友說道。他所用的欺詐手段既簡單又能掩人耳目，和2003年一家醜聞爆發的意大利公司帕馬拉特的詐騙犯所用的類似。爲了使資產負債表與高漲的收入表相符合，他還編撰了虛假的現金餘額文件。拉賈把組織公司的地點設在筒倉裏以掩人耳目，這樣一來，沒有人能夠根據事實情況推斷出他做的"壞事"。該封信說，薩蒂揚的真實收益和資金狀況比賬目中的數額要低90%多。幾天內，公司的股價下跌了90%左右。

For most firms that would mean a trip to the pearly gates. So it is a miracle that Satyam is still alive. Its finances look healthy. It should shortly be taken over by Tech Mahindra, now a 43% shareholder and part of Mahindra, one of India's best business houses. C.P. Gurnani, Satyam's chief executive, who will run the combined entity, has the cheerful air of a man who has successfully wrestled an alligator.

對於大多數公司而言，公司下跌了約90%的股票意味着到鬼門關走了一遭。故薩蒂揚能在此事中活下來可真是一個奇蹟。其財政狀況看起來並沒有什麼問題，公司也應當很快由馬恆達科技公司（現在持有43%的股權，是印度最大的商業機構之一）接手管理。即將經營這家合併實體的薩蒂揚首席執行官C.P. Gurnani也擺出了一副鬥敗巨鱷的欣喜姿態。

Kiran Karnik-who has the rare habit of listening more than he speaks-was caretaker chairman for about five months after the scandal. He says the episode shows "India has the ability to get a big, troubled firm back on track," and yields some general lessons about corporate survival.

相比起傾聽，基蘭•卡尼克更習慣說話，在拉賈的緋聞傳出後，他做了五個月左右的臨時董事長。他說這件事表明印度有能力讓大型卻陷入困境的公司迴歸正軌，同時他也學到企業生存的一些基本教訓。

First among those is not to pull the plug too soon. Although bankruptcy was an option, India's government, showing unusual deftness, instead chose to replace the board and take a chance that the firm could avoid receivership. A disorderly collapse would have hurt the reputation of the entire Indian technology industry, says Saurabh Srivastava, who co-founded Nasscom, a club of technology firms in India. Implicit state support was no doubt helpful, but this did not amount to a bail-out: Satyam had to raise bridge finance on its own from private-sector banks. By April 2009 the gamble had begun to pay off. After an auction, Tech Mahindra bought its stake and became an anchor investor.

第一條教訓是公司不要太快的終止業務。儘管公司可以選擇破產，但是印度政府展現出的不同尋常的處理事務的嫺熟技巧使公司可以選擇取代董事會成員，而且公司也有機會避免破產管理。與他人共同創立印度軟件和服務業企業行業協會（Nasscom）的薩烏拉博•斯利瓦斯塔瓦（Saurabh Srivastava）說，企業衰敗所帶來的混亂會影響整個印度技術產業的聲譽。儘管國家暗中支持肯定有所幫助，但是這種支持並不等於國家會擔保破產。薩蒂揚必須自己從私人銀行中籌集過橋資金。2009年4月，這場賭博要有結果了，一場拍賣會後，馬恆達科技公司購買了薩蒂揚的股份，成爲其主要投資者。

The second lesson is that survival is about people: customers and staff. In the weeks after the scandal broke Mr Karnik spent time meeting not just the bosses of client companies but also middle managers, to agree on yardsticks for judging Satyam's recovery. Mr Gurnani, who became chief executive in June 2009, says that in his first year he spent 250 days travelling, mainly seeing customers. Some trophy clients, including BP and Coca-Cola, jumped ship, but others, including GE, did not. A core of retained customers allowed the business to stabilise within a year or so.

第二條教訓是公司要生存，顧客和員工不可少。在緋聞傳出的幾周裏，爲了達成恢復薩蒂揚所需要的尺碼，破產的卡尼克不僅花時間會見了客戶公司的老闆，同時也會見了自己公司的中層管理人員。2009年6月成爲薩蒂揚董事長的Gurnani說，在他擔任的第一年裏，他花費了250天的時間進行走訪，其主要走訪對象是客戶。包括英國石油公司和可口可樂公司在內的一些大型客戶都跳槽了，但是美國通用電氣公司等卻沒有。許多核心顧客都留了下來，但他們要求薩蒂揚應在一年左右的時間內把公司的業務穩定下來。

The last lesson is about the importance of keeping the end-game in sight. Mr Karnik recalls that, within weeks of the collapse, government types suggested that the firm might stay independent after all. "I said it was like a vegetable-if you delay selling, the price will go down. If you leave it too long you'll have to pay someone to take it away." Mahindra's initial stake was a form of engagement. Now that Satyam is stabilised and most of its legal cases are resolved, Mahindra is ready for marriage.

最後是要牢記結束遊戲的重要性。卡尼克回憶說，在公司潰敗的幾周內，政府認爲薩蒂揚或許終究不受他人左右。"我說，這就像蔬菜，如果你延遲了它的銷售，價格便會下跌；如果你把它放太久，那你就有必要花錢僱人來把這些蔬菜拿走。"馬恆達的初始股權是以一種合約的形式存在。薩蒂揚事件既然已穩定下來，其大部分的法律案件也得以解決，所以馬恆達準備把薩蒂揚給"娶過來"。

A full takeover makes sense. Satyam has strengths, including its people. Oddly for a self-confessed crook, Mr Raju invested in training. But the industry has moved on since 2009. Satyam's share of the top six firms' sales has fallen from 10% to 4%. An executive at a rival firm sniffs that it "is not really relevant" any more. Big-ticket customers have become far more important. TCS, India's biggest IT firm, now has 46 clients which spend over $50m a year. Satyam has four. Nimish Joshi of CLSA, a broker, worries that winning big deals or scaling up existing accounts will be tough.

全面收購在情理之中。薩蒂揚有其優勢，如它的顧客和員工。奇怪的是，對於一個公開承認自己是騙子的人而言，拉賈卻投資於訓練。但自2009年以來，科技產業就不斷向前發展。薩蒂揚擁有的前六大公司的銷售額股份已從10%下跌至4%。一家對手公司的經理卻嗤之以鼻，認爲這沒有關聯。大客戶變得更爲重要。印度最大的信息技術公司印度塔塔諮詢服務公司如今已有46位一年花費5000多萬美元的客戶。而這樣的客戶薩蒂揚有四個。里昂證劵公司（CLSA）的破產者尼米什•喬希擔憂爭取大型交易或是按比例放大現有賬戶都很困難。

Still, uniting Satyam with Tech Mahindra will create the fifth-largest Indian IT firm. Tech Mahindra has its own issues-it is skewed towards telecoms customers, which have been shrinking. Targets to double the combined firm's sales by 2015 look entirely unrealistic, but the hope is that its clout and expertise will allow it to claw its way back to the big league.

然而，若是把薩蒂揚和馬恆達科技有限公司合併爲一個公司，那它將會成爲印度第五大科技公司。馬恆達科技有自己的問題，即該公司偏向於電信客戶，但是客戶的數量卻正在縮小。該公司制定的到2015年公司的總銷售額翻兩番的目標完全不現實，但希望仍在，而這希望就是憑藉公司的影響力與專業能力讓其重新成爲本行業的佼佼者。

There are a few, very Indian, loose ends-a lawsuit by Mr Raju's relatives, who say they have lost out, and a claim by the taxman, who appears, ludicrously, to want to tax the fictional profits. But Satyam will soon disappear into its suitor's arms. That it has found a good home is not unusual-Enron's best bit is now owned by Warren Buffett, and WorldCom, another victim of a big accounting scandal, was picked up by Verizon, one of America's leading telecoms firms. But Satyam's shareholders have done unusually well, losing only about 75% of their money.

這起詐騙事件中還有一些事情未解決，如說自己虧本的拉賈親戚們提起的訴訟，以及竟然荒唐地想要徵收虛假利潤稅的收稅員發表的聲明。但是薩蒂揚不久後便消失在收購公司的懷抱之中。它尋到的好歸宿並沒有什麼特別之處，安然公司最好的一塊現在由沃倫•巴菲特所有，另外一家大型財務醜聞的受害者世界通信也已由美國領先的電信公司之一的威瑞森所購。但是薩蒂揚的股東們卻做的很好，僅失去了自身75%的錢。

The mystery remains Mr Raju's motive. He awaits trial. For the moment the best insight comes from his letter of confession. "It was like riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off without being eaten."

拉賈的動機仍是一個謎。如今他還在候審中。而目前對此謎團最好的解釋出自於他的悔過書。"這就像騎着一頭老虎，你不知道如何從虎背上下來，還不要被吃掉."