Elon Musk has been straining for some time against the idea that Tesla should be seen as a carmaker. Rather, as the first all-purpose robotics company, its future lies in equipping and running a global fleet of driverless taxis and in selling humanoid robots.
埃隆•马斯克(Elon Musk)这段时间一直在煞费苦心地反驳特斯拉(Tesla)是一家汽车制造商的说法。相反，他主张，作为首家多用途机器人公司，特斯拉的未来在于打造并运营一支全球无人驾驶出租车车队，以及销售人形机器人。
The full financial implications of that attempted pivot are starting to come into focus. This week, Tesla signalled a lurch back into what is expected to be negative free cashflow territory as it gears up for the long-awaited dawn of the robots. A decade after its heavy spending on electric vehicle development led to bankruptcy worries, Musk is once again getting ready to burn through mountains of cash in pursuit of a big dream.
这一转型尝试的全部财务影响正开始显现。本周，特斯拉发出信号称，随着其准备迎接机器人时代的曙光，该公司的自由现金流预计将回落至负值区间。十年前，特斯拉在电动汽车研发上的巨额投入曾引发破产担忧，如今马斯克再度准备为追逐一个宏伟的梦想而大举烧钱。
Tesla’s latest earnings report, released on Wednesday, underlined how untethered it has become from the financial strictures it once observed as an automobile company. Musk once talked confidently about growing vehicle sales by 50 per cent a year and boasted of his company’s ability to maintain profit margins well in excess of much of the auto industry.
特斯拉周三发布的最新财报突显出，该公司已在多大程度上脱离其作为一家汽车企业曾经遵守的财务纪律。马斯克曾自信地谈到汽车销量每年增长50%，并夸耀他的公司能够保持远高于汽车行业多数竞争者的利润率。