The Federal Trade Commission commends Apple and Eric Schmidt’s decision on their parting of the ways this morning, but it appears that the federal investigation into the so-called "interlocking directorates" will continue, and that cannot be good news for either company.
今天（8月3日）早上，美国联邦交易委员会（FTC）对谷歌CEO埃里克•施密特（Eric Schmidt）退出苹果董事会的举措表示欢迎。但是，联邦部门对谷歌和苹果的“联合董事”问题调查似乎还将继续，这对两家公司来说都是什么好消息。
In a statement released this afternoon, FTC Bureau of Competition Director Richard Feinstein says "We will continue to investigate remaining interlocking directorates between the companies.”
在今天下午公布的一份声明中，FTC竞争事务处主任理查德•范恩斯坦（Richard Feinstein）表示：“我们将继续调查两家公司其余的关联董事问题。”
The full statement reads:
声明的原文如下: "On August 3, 2009, Apple announced that Eric E. Schmidt, Chief Executive Officer of Google, was stepping down from its board. ’We have been investigating the Google/Apple interlocking directorates issue for some time and commend them for recognizing that sharing directors raises competitive issues, as Google and Apple increasingly compete with each other,’ said Bureau of Competition Director Richard Feinstein. “We will continue to investigate remaining interlocking directorates between the companies.
"The FTC’s Bureau of Competition works with the Bureau of Economics to investigate alleged anticompetitive business practices and, when appropriate, recommends that the Commission take law enforcement action. "
“2009年8月3日，苹果发表声明称谷歌首席执行官埃里克•施密特退出苹果董事会。FTC调查谷歌和苹果的联合董事问题已经有一段时间了，我们对这一举动表示欢迎，因为两家公司已经意识到兼任董事可能引发的竞争问题，而两家公司之间的竞争也日趋激烈。” 理查德•范恩斯坦（Richard Feinstein）表示：“我们将继续调查两家公司其余的关联董事。”“联邦交易委员会的竞争事务处和经济事务处正合作调查两家公司有可能存在的反竞争的商业行为，如果证据确凿，我们会建议交易委员会在适当的时机采取法律措施。”
That’s a big time bummer for Apple and Google, both of which are facing various levels of federal inquiry. Neither needs to be attracting more government attention, and the statement by the FTC just goes to show how late Apple and Google were in recognizing the conflicts of interest Schmidt’s ongoing role on Apple’s board posed. Google is already facing anti-competitive inquiries from the feds; and as we learned Friday, the FCC has Apple under scrutiny for banning the Google Voice app from the company’s popular App Store.
联邦机构的这一决定对两家公司肯定都是一记闷棍，因为谷歌和苹果公司目前都在接受多起由联邦不同级别司法机构发起的调查。两家公司肯定都不愿意再招惹更多来自政府部门的注意。FTC的这一声明恰恰表明两家公司认识到埃里克•施密特兼任苹果董事可能引发两家公司之间利益冲突已经为时过晚。谷歌已经需要面对联邦的反垄断调查；而在刚刚过去的上周五（7月31日），苹果公司因为将谷歌的Voice应用程序从自己深受欢迎的App Store（苹果网店）撤下而接受了美国联邦通信委员会（FCC）的调查。
责任编辑：wangpeng6151
