【文章标题】：PayPal, Declined 【文章标题翻译】：PayPal，被拒
【文章正文】： Back in 2013, when it was still owned by auction site eBay, PayPal
tried to buy
Stripe. At the time, Stripe was just three years old. Founded by Irish brothers Patrick and John Collison, it had raised $40 million in venture funding and was building a reputation among web software developers for the ease with which it allowed them to integrate payments. Backers included PayPal’s own founders, who had long since departed the company but remained convinced online payment services could be made more efficient.
早在2013年，当时仍归拍卖网站eBay所有的PayPal
试图收购
Stripe。当时，Stripe成立仅三年。它由爱尔兰兄弟帕特里克·科里森和约翰·科里森创立，已筹集4000万美元风险投资，并因让网络软件开发者能够轻松集成支付而声名鹊起。其支持者中包括PayPal自己的创始人，他们早已离开公司，但仍然坚信在线支付服务可以变得更高效。
“It’s a little impetuous to go to PayPal founders and say payments on the internet are totally broken,”
said
John about his pitch. “But look, you can WhatsApp anyone around the world and it’s free. It’s a remarkable act of co-ordination between the telcos and ISPs and the people who own the fibre underneath the sea to create this global communications network. Then, if you look at the economic infrastructure, we haven’t even started.”
“去对PayPal创始人说互联网支付完全行不通，是有点鲁莽的，”
说
John在谈到他的推销时如此表示。 “但你看，你可以用WhatsApp联系世界上任何人，而且是免费的。这是电信运营商、互联网服务提供商和拥有海底光缆的人之间为了创建这个全球通信网络而进行的非凡协作。然而，再看看经济基础设施，我们甚至还没有开始。”
The brothers articulated a broader vision of internet commerce, unconstrained by clunky payments infrastructure. “That had been the original vision of PayPal, but they hadn’t actually made it happen, so I think they got us, in a way that a lot of people didn’t,” John
said
.
兄弟俩阐述了更广阔的互联网商业愿景，不受笨拙的支付基础设施的束缚。 “那是PayPal最初的愿景，但他们并没有真正实现，所以我觉得他们懂我们，而很多人不懂，”John
说
。
By 2013, Stripe was beginning to find traction. The following year it processed 1.75 billion, supported by volume growth that would go on to compound at 70% per year for the next ten years. Having been rebuffed in its attempts to acquire Stripe, PayPal turned its attentions elsewhere. In September, it
announced
the acquisition of Chicago-based Braintree for 26.2 million the year before.
到2013年，Stripe开始获得发展势头。第二年，其支付处理量达到70亿美元，估值达到17.5亿美元，这得益于接下来十年每年70%的复合增长率。在收购Stripe的尝试遭到拒绝后，PayPal将注意力转向了别处。同年9月，它
宣布
以8亿美元收购总部位于芝加哥的Braintree——顺带还得到了Venmo，而Braintree在一年前仅以2620万美元收购了Venmo。
Like Stripe, Braintree was founded to make online payments easier. Its growth was fueled by big clients, including Uber and Airbnb. In 2014, it processed $23 billion of volume, a large portion of which was mobile. The deal with PayPal should have accelerated growth. “The hardest thing about acquiring the customer is getting them to enter their payment credentials for the first time,” Braintree CEO Bill Ready
said
. Users of apps built on Braintree would no longer have to enter a credit card number if they were one of PayPal’s 150 million users – an especially strong selling point for users of mobile apps, who were less inclined to enter their credit card numbers on tiny screens.
与Stripe类似，Braintree的创立宗旨也是让在线支付更简单。其增长由大型客户推动，包括Uber和Airbnb。2014年，其处理量达到230亿美元，其中很大一部分来自移动端。与PayPal的交易本应加速增长。 “获取客户最难的一点是让他们首次输入支付凭证，”Braintree首席执行官Bill Ready
说
。如果应用是基于Braintree构建的，且用户是PayPal的1.5亿用户之一，那么他们就无需再输入信用卡号——这对移动应用用户来说是一个特别有力的卖点，因为他们不太愿意在小屏幕上输入信用卡号。
But Stripe’s software was seen as easier to use and over time it gained share. Over the next decade, while Stripe grew payment volume at 70% per annum, Braintree grew at 43%. Last year, Stripe processed 600 billion.
但Stripe的软件被认为更易用，并逐渐获得了市场份额。在接下来的十年里，Stripe的支付量以每年70%的速度增长，而Braintree的增长率为43%。去年，Stripe处理了1.9万亿美元的交易量，而Braintree为6000亿美元。
Now, Stripe is turning the tables. Earlier this month, it
was reported
that Stripe and private equity firm Advent have offered to acquire PayPal for around 159 billion in a secondary tender offer. According to news reports, the proposed deal would see Stripe and Advent each own an equal 50% stake in PayPal, and is backed by $50 billion in committed bank financing.
如今，Stripe正在扭转局面。本月早些时候，据
报道
Stripe与私募股权公司Advent已提出以约530亿美元收购PayPal。此前不久，Stripe在二次要约收购中获得了1590亿美元的估值。据新闻报道，拟议交易将使Stripe和Advent各自持有PayPal 50%的股权，并获得500亿美元的银行承诺融资支持。
So what does Stripe see in PayPal? After a decade of drift, three CEOs in three years and a string of unforced errors, it’s a fair question. But few have watched PayPal’s fortunes as closely as the Collisons, who have at turns been inspired by and confounded by the company. To explore what they see in it – and whether $53 billion comes close to the right price – read on.
那么，Stripe看中了PayPal的什么？在经历了十年的漂流、三年三任CEO以及一系列非受迫性失误之后，这是一个合理的问题。但很少有人像科里森兄弟那样密切关注PayPal的命运，他们时而受到这家公司的启发，时而又被它困惑。想要探究他们看中了什么——以及530亿美元是否接近合理价格——请继续阅读。
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