在去年11月的北京車展上，韓國現代汽車(Hyundai Motor)公司的管理人員看到了被他們稱為"令人震驚"的一幕。
At the Beijing motor show last November, officials of South Korea's Hyundai Motor Company saw what they describe as a "shocking" scene.
在他們眼里，中國汽車制造商們展示的一些新車型--例如遼寧曙光汽車集團(SG Automotive)的"旗勝"和天馬汽車集團(Tianma Auto)的"英雄"--看上去與現代的圣達菲(Santa Fe)和下屬企業起亞汽車(Kia Motors)的索蘭托(Sorento)很相似。
To their eyes, some of the new models displayed by Chinese carmakers - such as the Qisheng by Liaoning SG Automotive and the Yingxiong by Tianma Auto - looked similar to Hyundai's Santa Fe and its affiliate Kia Motors' Sorento.
現代汽車的管理人員Jake Jang回憶道："當我們看到中國的展車時，我們認為那是一模一樣的復制品。前后外飾看上去與我們的運動型多功能汽車(SUV)非常相似。"
"The moment we saw the Chinese models, we thought they were replicas. The front and rear exteriors looked so similar to our sports utility vehicles," recalls Jake Jang, a Hyundai official.
中國汽車制造商否認了現代的指控。遼寧曙光汽車集團的管理人員高彥龍(音譯)表示："現代汽車工作人員對我們的旗勝車型發表的言論毫無根據，我們自己造出了這些汽車。"天馬汽車發表的言論同樣直接，一位管理人員表示："我們無需對現代汽車方面的言論進行任何回復。他們怎么想是他們的自由。但我可以告訴你，我們的英雄車型完全是自主開發的。我們還向政府注冊了相關的專利。"
The Chinese carmakers reject Hyundai's accusation. "What the people at Hyundai said about our Qisheng is completely groundless. We made the vehicles ourselves," says Gao Yanlong, an official at Liaoning. Tianma was equally blunt. "We don't need to make any response to the comments by Hyundai. It is their freedom to think that way. But I can tell you, our Yingxiong is fully self-developed. We also registered its related patents with the government," an official says.
然而，現代汽車的高管回到韓國后，越來越擔心中國競爭對手正在科技和設計方面縮小與韓國的差距，對該公司而言，這種發展可能是災難性的。
Still, Hyundai executives returned home with growing fears that their Chinese rivals are closing the technological and design gap with South Korea - a development that could be disastrous for the company.
上月，起亞汽車發生了部分工人因涉嫌向中國出售汽車技術而被捕的事情，突顯出韓國汽車業的這種危機感。他們被指控盜竊了索蘭托以及一款將于12月推出的新車型的關鍵信息。目前尚不清楚是誰涉嫌購買了這些技術。
The sense of crisis in South Korea's automotive industry was heightened last month when it emerged that some of Kia's workers had been arrested for allegedly selling car technology to China. They?were accused of stealing crucial information on the Sorento and a new model that will be launched in December. It is not known who the alleged buyers of the technology were.
"盡管我們在成本方面相對較弱，但我們認為，我們在質量和科技方面領先中國，"韓國商工會議所(Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry)的Kim Hyun-soo表示，"但是，當技術外泄可能使中國迅速追趕我們的優勢時，這種信心受到了動搖。"
"We believe that we are ahead of China on quality and technology, although we are relatively weak on the cost side," says Kim Hyun-soo at the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry. "But the belief is being shaken as technology leaks may allow China to quickly catch up on our strengths."
對中國制造商可能迅速趕上的擔憂，已在許多實業家和立法者中間造成了一種被圍攻的感覺--盡管韓國自己也是通過復制日本和美國的技術（至少在其發展初期是這樣），成長為世界第11大經濟體的。
The fear that Chinese manufacturers are fast catching up has generated a sense of siege among many industrialists and lawmakers, even though South Korea itself grew into the world's 11th largest economy by replicating Japanese and US technology, at least in its initial development stage.
韓國國家情報局(National Intelligence Service)表示，在2003年至2007年5月間，共查獲了101起工業間諜案，據稱這些案件為國家帶來的潛在損失高達1435億美元。上月，檢察部門逮捕了浦項制鐵(Posco)子公司Posdata的研究員，原因是其涉嫌試圖將韓國開發的無線寬帶技術Wibro走私到美國。
The National Intelligence Service says it identified 101 cases of industrial espionage between 2003 and May 2007, which it claims cost the country $143.5bn (€106bn, ￡72bn) in potential losses. Last month prosecutors arrested researchers at Posdata, an affiliate of Posco, the steelmaker, for allegedly attempting to smuggle Wibro - a wireless broadband technology developed by Korea - into the US.
