这是我首次与一位俄罗斯亿万富翁会面。地点是在纽约喜来登酒店（Sheraton New York Hotel）一间毫无特色的会议室，在由两排会议室组成的一个长走廊的尽头。俄罗斯钢铁富豪、谢韦尔钢铁公司（Severstal）（2011年收入为150亿美元）的首席执行官阿列克谢•莫尔达索夫正在该酒店出席一个钢铁行业会议，他也是俄罗斯在美国的最大投资者之一。莫尔达索夫的公关人员提醒我说，他与其他惹人注目的俄罗斯行业寡头截然相反。他不收藏游艇，也不买美国棒球队，他支持的是家乡切列波韦茨当地的一支曲棍球队，他的父母曾在切列波韦茨的一家大型钢铁厂工作，如今该厂已被谢韦尔钢铁公司纳入旗下。

    莫尔达索夫的助手说，在他难得不提到数字、战略或业务时，也会展现出另一种激情，即兴吟诵几句烂熟于胸的俄罗斯诗歌。

    莫尔达索夫出现时身穿蓝色西服套装，打着一条松散的蓝色领带，用有力的握手来迎接我。他说着流利但有浓重口音的英语，这是他在英国诺森比亚大学（Northumbria University）读商科时学到的。46岁的莫尔达索夫身材修长，一头棕发干净利落，看起来很年轻。事实上他从低级财务经理起步，到1996年30岁时就已掌管谢韦尔钢铁，通过收购钢铁、采矿和煤炭公司构建起了一个集团企业。据报道，他的个人净资产值已超过180亿美元。

    2004年，莫尔达索夫成为率先在美国投资的俄罗斯大公司之一：谢韦尔钢铁收购了位于密西根州迪尔伯恩、具有传奇历史的Rouge钢铁厂。“当时美国钢铁厂的状况还不如经过技改的俄罗斯钢铁厂。”莫尔达索夫说，“许多技术已有150年的历史。这些钢铁厂存在投资不足的问题已有很多年。”另外，和高炉年久失修一样严重的问题还有工人士气低落。“人们都以为Rouge会破产，因此有很多焦虑情绪。企业文化甚至比俄罗斯还糟。同时，工作条例也问题多多。”

    It was my first encounter with a Russian billionaire. The setting was a nondescript meeting room, down a long, bland hallway of meeting rooms, at the Sheraton New York Hotel, where Alexey Mordashov was attending a steel industry conference. His press people had cautioned that Mordashov, Russia's leading steel magnate as chief of Severstal (2011 revenues: $15 billion) and one of his nation's biggest investors in the U.S., is the antithesis of the flamboyant Russian oligarch. He eschews collecting yachts or U.S. basketball franchises, and instead supports the local hockey team in his hometown of Cherepovets, where his parents labored in the giant steel mill Severstal now owns.

    On an infrequent break from talking numbers, strategy and business, his lieutenants say, Mordashov displays another passion by breaking into a recital of the Russian poems he knows by heart.

    Mordashov, attired in a blue suit and loosely-knotted blue tie, greets me with a crunching handshake worthy of a welder. He speaks fluent if heavily accented English learned as a business student at Northumbria University in Britain. At 46, Mordashov is trim and youthful-looking with neatly-cropped brown hair. Indeed, after starting as a low-level finance manager, he rose to head Severstal in 1996 at age 30, building a conglomerate by purchasing steel, mining and coal companies. His net worth reportedly exceeds $18 billion.

    Mordashov became the one of the first major Russian investors in the U.S. when Severstal purchased the legendary Rouge plant in Dearborn, Michigan, in 2004. "Steel plants in the U.S. were in worse shape than the Russian plants we renovated," says Mordashov. "A lot of the technology was 150 years old. They'd suffered from under-investment for many years." Worker morale, he adds, was as big a problem as decaying furnaces. "People were expecting Rouge to go bankrupt, so there was a lot of anxiety. The corporate culture problem was even worse than in Russia. And at the same time, the work rules were more difficult."

    过去八年，莫尔达索夫已投入14亿美元对Rouge老厂进行翻新，工厂现名为谢韦尔钢铁迪尔伯恩工厂（Severstal Dearborn）。“绿色科技是未来，”他说，“该厂正在为节能汽车制造钢铁。”

    谢韦尔钢铁是制造超高强度轻质钢材的先行者，这类钢材通过降低汽车自重提高单位油耗行驶里程，但同时满足最严格的碰撞标准。这项计划是如此吸引人，以至于美国能源部（Department of Energy）都初步批准了为迪尔伯恩工厂高端钢材扩产提供7.40亿美元贷款，但让莫尔达索夫大感意外的是今年1月份美国能源部取消了这一贷款许诺。

    “我们正在寻找扩产所需资金，希望填上美国能源部留下的缺口。”莫尔达索夫说，“我们的迪尔伯恩工厂早已开始生产轻质钢材，但要满足未来为达到燃油标准、美国所需的产能还远远不够。”

    鉴于莫尔达索夫在美国投资钢铁行业遭受的巨额损失，他对于钢铁行业以及美国的前景依然如此乐观，实在是难能可贵。2008年初当市场处于巅峰时，谢韦尔钢铁出资26亿美元在俄亥俄州、西弗吉尼亚州和马里兰州购买了3家钢铁厂。当经济衰退重击钢铁销量和价格时，莫尔达索夫大幅削减产量，并将3家钢铁厂挂牌出售。2011年3月，他将这三家厂卖给了采矿业富豪、以长岛大宅著称的艾拉•伦内特控制的公司，售价仅8,000万美元，三年内损失超过25亿美元。

    莫尔达索夫决定集中投资两家钢铁厂：受益于汽车行业复苏的迪尔伯恩工厂，和谢韦尔钢铁投资15亿美元、在密西西比州哥伦布新建的工厂。莫尔达索夫说，密西西比新厂将成为美国南部汽车制造企业的领先供应商。

    莫尔达索夫认为，最最糟糕的是很多人对美国的未来仍过于悲观。“近来我们已经看到美国经济有显著改观，但这一点没有被很好地认识。”他说，“美国在提高生产率方面做得很好。迪尔伯恩工厂正在用更少的员工制造更多钢铁。工会接受了优化的工作条例。产业复苏正在发生，但人们对此认识不足。”

    他还指出了第二项重大改观是能源成本显著下降。“这是由于页岩气革命。我知道有位俄罗斯企业家打算在美国南部建一家化肥厂，因为那里的能源成本如此低廉。”谢韦尔钢铁部分持股的一家工业园区正在吸引密西西比州当地的钢铁加工公司入驻，这是当前全美情形的一个缩影。

    在莫尔达索夫同我轻轻握手道别时，他说，“美国最需要保留的就是企业家精神。这为创造就业提供了原动力。这创造了美国人重要的生命品质。”

    阿列克谢•莫尔达索夫相信，建立在伟大制造业之上的这个帝国将迎来一片新天地。

    译者：早稻米

    In the past eight years, Mordashov has poured $1.4 billion into refurbishing the former Rouge plant, now called Severstal Dearborn. "The future is in green energy," he says, "it's in making steel for energy-efficient cars."

    Severstal is a pioneer in producing extra-strong but lightweight steel that improves gas mileage by reducing the vehicles' weight, but also meets the most stringent crash standards. Its initiative so impressed the Department of Energy that it gave preliminary approval for a $740 million loan to expand Dearborn's advanced steel output, but to Mordashov's shock, canceled the commitment in January.

    "We're now looking for financing we didn't get from the DOE to expand production," says Mordashov. "We're already making the lightweight steel at Dearborn, but the U.S. will need far more production in the future to meet fuel standards."

    Given his big losses in the U.S., it's remarkable that Mordashov remains so optimistic about the future of steel -- and America. At the top of the market in early 2008, Severstal paid $2.6 billion for plants in Ohio, West Virginia and Maryland. When the recession pounded both volumes and prices, Mordashov slashed production and put the mills up for sale. In March of 2011, he sold all three to companies controlled by mining magnate Ira Rennert, renowned for his gigantic "house that ate the Hamptons" on Long Island. The price: just $80 million, leaving a loss of over $2.5 billion in just three years.

    Mordashov decided to concentrate Severstal's dollars on two mills, the Dearborn facility because it benefits from the resurgence of the auto industry, and a new, $1.5 billion mill that Severstal recently opened in Columbus, Mississippi. The Mississippi plant, says Mordashov, will also become a leading supplier to automakers in the southern U.S.

    Most of all, Mordashov reckons that many people are far too glum about America's future. "We've seen a significant change in the U.S. economy recently, and it's not well understood," he says. "The U.S. has done a great job improving productivity. We're making a lot more steel in Dearborn with fewer people. The unions have accepted much better work rules. An industrial renaissance is happening, and it's underestimated."

    He also notes a second big improvement, a major reduction in energy costs. "It's because of the shale gas revolution. I know a Russian entrepreneur who wants to build a fertilizer plant in the southern U.S. because energy costs are so low." An industrial park, part-owned by Severstal, is attracting local steel fabrication companies in Mississippi, epitomizing what's happening all over America.

    As Mordashov gives me a parting, buzz-saw handshake, he says, "What you need to keep most in the U.S. is the entrepreneurial spirit. It provides the impetus for job creation. It has created a great quality of life for Americans."

    Alexey Mordashov is convinced that an empire built on great manufacturing is poised to strike again.