对于寻找优秀公司的投资者来说，要在专业化与多元化之间进行选择，一般来说，专业化公司成功的概率更高，但是现在的世界变化剧烈，以前多元化遇到的障碍，比如沟通网络、物流运输，现在都通过IT、通讯技术和快速的空中运输打通了，同时在每一个领域都有很多细分领域的地方怎样才算专业化？看到《财富》中文版上的一篇讲强生公司的文章，觉得业内多元化这个角度给我们思考公司提供了新角度，遂转贴于此，供同好参考。——附记
强生成功秘诀：业内多元发展
www.fortunechina.com 2009年04月29日
作者：Patricia Seller
为了今年的财富500强这期杂志，高级撰稿人杰夫•科尔文（Geoff Colvin）和我有幸研究了排行榜上最耐久的公司之一的强生（Johnson & Johnson）。强生公司是一家医疗保健公司，总部位于新泽西州的新布朗斯维克。该公司一向对媒体比较低调，但是在这次经济危机中，公司决定是时候将这123年来的成功经历公之于众了。真是一个很了不起的故事啊！
首先，这些财务数据足以证明强生的实力与稳定性：
——去年，强生的销售额上升6%，美国500强排名上升6位至第29位（同期，美国经济不断下滑）。
——去年，强生的利润上升22%，而同期五百强企业整体利润下降85%。这使得强生成为美国第六大最赚钱公司，第五大最有价值公司，超过了宝洁（Procter & Gamble）、伯克希尔哈撒韦（Berkshire Hathaway）、雪佛龙（Chevron）、IBM、通用电气（General Electric）以及许多业绩很好的公司。
——强生的信用等级仍然是AAA：拥有这一信用等级的公司中，只有四家是非金融公司，强生是其中之一（另外三家分别为埃克森（Exxon）、微软（Microsoft）与ADP）。拥有AAA信用等级的公司数量正在不断下降。
——去年，强生股价下跌仅8%，而标准普尔指数整体下跌超过30%。
数据还不止这些。审慎的财务政策是强生成功的关键，但这只是杰夫和我总结出来的五点策略中的一点。其他四点分别为：面向未来；专业管理；超越盈利；业内多元。
最后一点——业内多元——尤其值得研究，因此我想补充一些刚才没有提到的细节。毕竟，这一策略解释了强生是如何从1886年成立之初的外科绷带制造商，成长为一家业务广泛的卫生保健企业的。强生现在拥有三个业务集团，每一个都足以成为业界领袖。
强生的好多产品都家喻户晓，有些产品消费者只知其名，但不知道是强生生产的，譬如强生的婴儿洗发水、泰诺、露得清皮肤护理产品与李施德林漱口水（2006年强生收购辉瑞消费保健业务时获得）。医疗器械与诊断部门为手术室和医生办公室提供产品，譬如说缝合线、验血器材和人造关节等。制药业务销售处方药，如用于治疗注意力缺陷障碍的Concerta、治疗关节炎的Remicade、艾滋病药物Prezista等。
人们常说，多元化经营可以降低风险——一种业务受打击，另一种可能上涨——这种说法在强生得以体现，因为各个业务所带来的收入每年都有变化。
另一个原因就是多元经营促进各业务间的技术融合。强生内部这种创新的例子最早就是药物洗脱支架，这一技术是20世纪90年代的一次会议中，集团器械部门的工程师与药物部门的科研人员合作推出的。该技术是心脏病治疗中的一次突破。
首席执行官韦尔登还提到另外一个例子：有些科研人员在开发产品的时候撞了南墙，他们把自己的困难贴到公司内部网，当天就收到了外地其他业务部门的一名科研人员发来的消息。他提供了答案，因为他攻读博士学位时研究重点就是这个问题。
韦尔登说：“我们公司内部专业能力很强，可以加以利用，不用去公司以外找人。”
去年11月，强生收购了Omrix生物制药公司，目前正在试图将该公司的生物药物与强生的外科绷带结合使用，帮助控制软组织流血。多部门合作也能使消费品获益。譬如，强生将实验室中取得的遮光剂技术进步应用到了露得清和Aveeno产品线中。
强生多元的医疗保健业务的第三个好处就是，能够用公司的各种产品为顾客提供终身服务。在强生的世界里，我们的生活就是从儿童爽身粉直到Efferdent假牙清洁剂。
与此类似，最近组建的强生综合护理部门的使命是关注病人而不是关注某一种产品。如果强生知道你患有糖尿病，那么它可以向你展示器械与诊断部门的血糖即时检测仪的优点，介绍消费品部门生产的Splenda甜味剂以及最近收购的健康媒体公司（HealthMedia）开发的健康管理软件。
目前，许多公司竭力寻求增长，试图从现有业务中挤出更大的价值，那么它们走强生的道路是很明智的：在一个涵盖广泛的行业里面寻求发展机会。
还有其他公司通过这种方式取得成功的吗？
One secret of J&J’s success: Diversify within a single industry
www.fortunechina.com 2009年04月29日 查看中文译文
By Patricia Sellers
For this year’s Fortune 500 issue, senior writer Geoff Colvin and I had the chance to look inside one of the list’s most enduring performers: Johnson & Johnson (JNJ). The New Brunswick, N.J.-based health care giant is notoriously media shy, but in the midst of the economic doom and gloom, the company decided it was time to tell its 123-year story of success. What a story that is.
For starters, here are some financial stats that point to J&J’s strength and stability:
-Last year, J&J’s sales rose 6%, and it jumped six places in the 500 ranking, to No. 29 (amidst 12 solid months of economic decline in the U.S).
-J&J’s profit increased 22% last year even as the 500’s profits dropped 85%. That made J&J the sixth most profitable company in America and the fifth most valuable, ahead of Procter & Gamble (PG), Berkshire Hathaway (BRKB), Chevron (CVX), IBM (IBM), General Electric (GE) and many other great performers.
-J&J still holds its triple-A credit rating solidly — one of only four non-financial companies (with Exxon, Microsoft, and ADP) in that dwindling club.
-J&J stock beat the market last year, falling 8% vs. the S&P’s drop of more than 30%.
The list goes on (you can find more stats in the story). Financial discipline is key to J&J’s success, but it’s only one of five principles that Geoff and I outline in our piece. The others are: focus on the future; let the experts run the business; have a purpose beyond profits; and diversify within a single industry.
This last lesson — diversify within a single industry — was particularly fascinating to study, so I wanted to offer further detail that didn’t make it into the story. After all, this strategy helps explain how J&J grew from a maker of surgical dressings, back when the company was founded in 1886, to a broadly based health care company with three business groups, each large enough to be an industry leader on its own.
Consumer Products includes the items everyone knows, and more of them than most people realize – Johnson’s Baby Shampoo, Tylenol, Neutrogena skin care products and Listerine mouthwash (acquired when J&J bought Pfizer’s consumer business in 2006). The Medical Devices and Diagnostics group supplies operating rooms and doctors’ offices with products including sutures, blood tests and artificial joints. The Pharmaceuticals business sells prescription drugs that include Concerta for attention deficit disorder, Remicade for arthritis, Prezista for HIV/AIDS, and others.
The classic argument for a diversified approach is it reduces risk – as one industry gets hit, another may rise – and that rationale has panned out at J&J, where the percentage of revenue contributed by each business varies from year to year.
Another explanation has to do with convergence of technology across businesses. One of the earliest examples of this kind of innovation at J&J was the drug-eluting stent, a breakthrough for cardiovascular disease, which resulted from a meeting in the 1990’s between engineers from the devices group and scientists from the pharma group.
CEO Weldon also tells the story of some scientists who had hit a wall with the product they were developing. They put their problem up on an internal company site, and that same day they heard from a scientist in another business in a different location. He responded with the answer; it had been the focus of his PhD work.
“We have all this expertise in-house so we can pull on it rather than having to go out and find somebody,” says Weldon.
Last November J&J acquired Omrix biopharmaceuticals and is now exploring the use of the company’s biologic drugs in tandem with J&J’s surgical dressings to help control soft tissue bleeding. Cross-pollination can also benefit consumer products. The company applied scientific advances in sunscreen technology from its research labs to its Neutrogena and Aveeno lines, for example.
A third benefit of J&J’s diverse portfolio of health care businesses is the opportunity to follow customers through their lifetimes and across the company’s portfolio. In J&J’s world, our lives are a journey from Baby Powder to Efferdent.
Similarly, focusing on the patient rather than on any single product is the mission of J&J’s recently formed comprehensive care group. If J&J knows you have diabetes, it can show you the virtues of a OneTouch glucose monitor from the device and diagnostics group, and of Splenda sweetener from consumer products, and of health management software from a recently acquired company called HealthMedia.
In these times, when many companies are struggling for growth and trying to squeeze more value out of existing businesses, they would be wise to follow J&J’s lead: Look for opportunities across a single broadly defined industry.
What other companies have had success with this approach?