It gives me great pleasure today to say a few words in praise of a man we will all miss very much. To be honest, I can’t imagine we will do without him when he’s gone. Bill Masters almost single-handed built up our sales force in the Houston area and developed the market position that we enjoy today. In only six years, he has brought the firm from a very low fifth position in the area sales to the point where we now outsell all but one of our competitors. Not only have we got 37 per cent of the market under Bill’s leadership; we are increas¬ing our share with each passing month.
As you know, the company has moved Bill to northern California to work his sales magic in one of this company’s competitive areas. But we know that if anyone can do it, Bill Masters can, and I know you all join me in wishing him the best of luck in his new work.
1. The speech was made ________.
A. at a welcome meeting B. after someone died
C. when somebody was leaving D. when they had a new manager
2. How long did Masters work there?
A. 37 years. B. Less than 5 years.
C. About six years. D. Since he began to work.
3 When Bill started to work in Houston area, he had to help him.
A. many people B. nobody C. about 37 people D. very few people
4. Bill increased the company’s sale________.
A. by 37 per cent every month B. to the second largest in the area
C. to be the fifth largest in the area D. five times as much as before
In New York, Ma Yun witnessed the Alibaba Group opening on the New York stock exchange with the largest initial public offering (IPO，新股发行) in American history. “Alibaba, the world’s largest Internet commerce company makes China equal to the US in the rapidly increasing global competition for technological innovation (创新) and economic transformation ” commented the South China Morning Post.
It has also made Ma China’s richest man with a fortune of around $25 billion (153 billion yuan), reported Reuters.
It’s reported that Ma’s rags-to-riches journey is just as spectacular as his Internet Empire. Ma failed the national college entrance exams twice before he was finally in Hangzhou Normal University on his third attempt and failed in finding a suitable job several times. Also, Mr Ma is a big believer in perseverance, which was proved in his English study experience.
However, it was his vision and goals that launched his career.
During a short trip to the US as an interpreter in 1995, Ma first experienced the Internet. He believed in the Internet’s business potential when few other Chinese people did. He started Alibaba in his Hangzhou apartment, with 17 friends and $60,000 of funds. At the time, when e-commerce was unheard of in China, “I called myself a blind man riding on the back of blind tigers,” he once said, according to The Guardian. His unusual ideas earned him the nickname “Crazy Jack Ma”.
Indeed, Ma is different. Although he is very thin and about 160cm tall, “Ma is yet animated and forceful,” said The Guardian. “He is funny, creative, and a compelling (引人注目的) speaker.
Ma told Time magazine that he was “old for the Internet”. He started to slow down and looked around. According to The Wall Street Journal, Ma “plans to open a tai chi club with the actor Jet Li, build an entrepreneur (企业家) university in Hangzhou and continue to work on several environmental projects.”What made him into e-commerce industry?
| A．His English learning experience. |
| B．His foresight and ambitions. |
| C．His belief in perseverance. |
| D．His 17 friends and $60,000 funds. |
What does the underlined sentence in Paragraph 5 mean?
| A．Ma is a blind man riding on a blind tiger. |
| B．Ma had no confidence in his business future. |
| C．Ma knew little about e-commerce. |
| D．Ma had not enough money at that time. |
What’s the personality of Ma Yun according to the passage?
| A．Funny and competitive. |
| B．Determined and creative. |
| C．Rich and different. |
| D．Attractive and believable. |
What’s the best title of the passage?
| A．The Development of Alibaba Group |
| B．Ma Yun’s Personal Life |
| C．Ma Yun’s Crazy Success |
| D．E-commerce in China |
The idea of being able to walk on water has long interested humans greatly. Sadly, biological facts prevent us ever accomplishing such a thing without artificial aid--we simply weigh too much, and all our mass pushes down through our relatively small feet, resulting in a lot of pressure that makes us sink.
However, several types of animals can walk on water. One of the most interesting is the common basilisk. Basilicus, a lizard (蜥蜴) native to Central and South America. It can run across water for a distance of several meters, avoiding getting wet by rapidly hitting the water's surface with its feet. The lizard will take as many as 20 steps per second to keep moving forward. For humans to do this, we'd need huge feet that we could bring up to our ears in order to create adequate "hitting. “
But fortunately there is an alternative: cornflour. By adding enough of this common thickening agent to water (and it does take a lot), you can create a "non-Newtonian" liquid that doesn't behave like normal water. Now, if the surface of the water is hit hard enough, particles(微粒) in the water group together for a moment to make the surface hard. Move quickly enough and put enough force into each step, and you really can walk across the surface of an adequately thick liquid of cornflour.
Fun though all this may sound, it's still rather messy and better read about in theory than carried out in practice, if you must do it, then keep the water wings handy in case you start to sink--and take a shower afterward!Walking on water hasn't become a reality mainly because humans _______.
| A．are not interested in it |
| B．have biological limitations |
| C．have not invented proper tools |
| D．are afraid to make an attempt |
What do we know about Basilicus from the passage?
| A．It is light enough to walk on water. |
| B．Its huge feet enable it to stay above water. |
| C．It can run across water at a certain speed. |
| D．Its unique skin keeps it from getting wet in water |
What is the function of the cornflour according to the passage?
| A．To create a thick liquid. |
| B．To turn the water into solid. |
| C．To help the liquid behave normally. |
| D．To enable the water to move rapidly. |
What is the author's attitude toward the idea of humans' walking on water?
| A．It is risky but beneficial. |
| B．It is interesting and worth trying. |
| C．It is crazy and cannot become a reality. |
| D．It is impractical though theoretically possible. |
When the swim season began, my 11-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, and I cut a deal. She would go to practice three times a week, and I wouldn’t make her compete in swim meets.
Elizabeth does not like swim meets. She gets horribly nervous because she is afraid that she will do something wrong and let everyone down. She started to talk about quitting swimming, which broke my heart because she loves swimming. So I came up with the deal.
Recently, Elizabeth’s team announced a T-shirt relay, which works like this: One person from each relay team puts on a T-shirt and a pair of socks and swims 50 meters. She takes off the clothes and put them on the next person, who then swims 50 meters. This continues until everyone on the team has completed a lap.
It wasn’t exactly a meet, because it would involve only team members. But Elizabeth thought it was. I told Elizabeth I really wanted her to go. She fought back angrily but finally agreed.
When the day for the T-shirt relay arrived, Elizabeth was nervous. She was chosen to swim the anchor leg (最后一棒).By the last leg, Elizabeth’s team had built up a narrow lead. Then it was Elizabeth’s turn to swim.
Approaching the halfway mark, she was still in the lead. Then somebody noticed that one of Elizabeth’s socks had fallen off and was floating in the pool. “She has to get that sock on before the end of the race,” a swimming official told Elizabeth’s team, “or you will be disqualified.”
Everybody on her team started shouting, “Elizabeth! Get the sock!” But she couldn’t hear them. Meanwhile, a girl in lane two was gaining on Elizabeth. Just then, a girl on my daughter’s team jumped in the pool, grabbed the sock, swam after Elizabeth and put the sock on Elizabeth.
With the sock finally on, Elizabeth swam her heart out for the last 15 meters and won! There was much celebration. And, for a few minutes, Elizabeth was the hero.
On the ride home, she relived her moment of glory again and again. She told me that if the T-shirt relay was an Olympic event, her team would win the gold medal, I told her that in my professional opinion, she was absolutely right.What do we know about the T-shirt relay?
| A．Elizabeth was eager to attend it. |
| B．Elizabeth made full preparations for it. |
| C．Elizabeth thought she was sure to fail the relay. |
| D．Elizabeth agreed to attend it after a lot of persuasion. |
What happened to Elizabeth when she was swimming the anchor leg?
| A．The girl on the other team swam faster than her. |
| B．She was disqualified for breaking the rule. |
| C．She was too nervous to swim. |
| D．One of her socks fell off. |
We can infer from the last paragraph that Elizabeth_____.
| A．believed she was the best of her team. |
| B．hoped to take part in the Olympics. |
| C．overcame her fear of swim meets. |
| D．was grateful for the girl’s help. |
What would be the best title for the text?
| A．Born to be a swimmer | B．Swimming in socks |
| C．The swim season | D．Never give up! |
Three Japanese tourists taking a holiday in Australia got stuck when their GPS told them they could drive from the mainland to an island, failing to mention the 15 kilometres of water and mud in between.
As they drove their hired car from Moreton Bay to nearby North Stradbroke Island, they started to notice the firm surface they were driving on giving way to the well-known bay mud. However, being confident that their GPS would direct them to a road soon, they decided to drive on, managing to travel around 500 metres before their car was up to its tires in mud. To make matters worse, the tide(潮汐) started to come in and soon forced them to seek help and abandon the vehicle. Just four hours later the car was trapped in two metres of water — to the great amusement of onlookers on the shore and passengers on passing boats and ferries.
Yuzu Noda, 21, said she was listening to the GPS and “it told us we could drive down there. It kept saying it would navigate(导航) us to a road. But we got stuck…there’s lots of mud.” She and her travel companions Tomonari Saeki, 22, and Keita Osada, 21, instead had to give up their plans for a day trip to the island and headed back to the Gold Coast of a lift from the RACQ tow truck(吊车) driver who was called to the trapped car. No such luck for the hired car though – after assessing the situation, no attempt was made to recover it. The students from Tokyo, who are due to return home tomorrow, said the experience would not put them off returning to Australia for another visit. Mr. Tomonari said, “It has rained every day on our six day holiday. Hopefully next time we come back, it will be sunny.”
The car was covered by insurance, but the tourists will have to pay up to about $1500 in extra charges.The three Japanese tourists got stuck because___________.
| A．there was no way to the island |
| B．their GPS was broken during their journey |
| C．their GPS had given the wrong information |
| D．their car was not made in Japan |
They didn’t abandon their car until _________.
| A．some onlookers went to save them |
| B．they got stuck in the mud |
| C．there came the tide |
| D．they managed to travel around 500 metres |
How did these Japanese students get back?
| A．They had to walk back to their living place. |
| B．They had to take a lift from the tow truck driver. |
| C．They had to repair their GPS and drove back. |
| D．They had to turn to passengers on boats and ferries. |
For some years the big drugmakers have been worrying about an approaching "patent cliff"—a fall in sales as the patents on their most popular pills expire or are struck down by legal challenges, with few new potential blockbusters to take their place. This week the patent on the best-selling drug in history expired—Lipitor, an anti-cholesterol pill which earned Pfizer nearly $11 billion in revenues last year.In all, pill like Lipitor with a combined $170 billion in annual sales will go off-patent by the end of 2015.
What is supposed to happen now is that lots of copycat firms rush in with "generic" (ie, chemically identical) versions of Lipitor at perhaps one-fifth of its price.Patients and health-care payers should reap the benefit.Pfizer's revenues should suffer. The same story will be repeated many times, as other best-selling drugs march over the patent cliff
But generics makers may face delays getting their cheaper versions to market.Ranbaxy, a Japanese-owned drugmaker, struggled to get regulators' approval for its generic version of Lipitor, and only won it on the day the patent expired.More importantly, research-based drug firms are using a variety of tactics to make the patent cliff slope more gently. Jon Leibowitz, chairman of America's Federal Trade Commission (FTC), is concerned by drugmakers filing additional patents on their products to put off the day when their protection expires.
Another tactic(策略) is "pay-for-delay", in which a drugmaker facing a legal challenge to its patent pays its would-be competitor to put off introducing its cheaper copy. In the year to October the FTC identified what it believes to be 28 such settlements. American and European regulators are looking into these deals. However, legal challenges against them have been delayed, and a bill to ban them is stuck in Congress.
To encourage generics makers to challenge patents on drugs, and introduce cheaper copies,
an American law passed in 1984 says that the first one to do so will get a 180-day exclusivity period,in which no other generics maker can sell versions of the drug in question, as Ranbaxy supposedly won with Lipitor.
However, Pfizer is exploiting a loophole(空子) in the 1984 law, which lets it appoint a second, authorised copycat—in this case, Watson, another American firm.According to BernsteinResearch, under the deal between the two drugmakers Pfizer will receive about 70% of Watson's revenues from its approved copy of Lipitor.More unusual, Pfizer has cut the price of its original version, and will keep marketing it vigorously. So Ranbaxy faces not one, but two competitors.
All this may raise Pfizer's sales by nearly $500m in the last half of 2015 compared with what they would otherwise have been, says Tim Anderson of BernsteinResearch, with revenues then falling after the 180 days are over. Others fear that Pfizer's tactics , if copied, will make the 180-day exclusivity period worth far less, and thus discourage generic firms from challenging patents in the first place.The underlined word “blockbusters” in Paragraph 1 refers to “_______’
| A．pills that sell very well |
| B．new patents to appear |
| C．drugmakers to compete with Pfizer |
| D．challenges which Pfizer has to face |
What is the tactic mentioned in Paragraph 4?
| A．Legal challenges against expired patents have been paid for putting off the cheaper copy. |
| B．Bills to prohibit generic makers have been stuck in Congress. |
| C．Drugmakers try to spend money delaying filing additional patents on popular pills |
| D．Patent-holders give possible competitors money to prevent more losses. |
Pfizer exploit a loophole in the 1984 law mainly by ________.
| A．marketing Lipitor more actively |
| B．making the price of Lipitor go up |
| C．cooperating with Watson to beat Ranbaxy |
| D．encouraging Watson to produce cheaper copies |
How many tactics are adopted by patent-holders in the passage?
| A．Two | B．Three | C．Four | D．Five |
Which of the following might be the best title for the passage?
| A．Drugmakers’ struggle |
| B．Generic makers’ dilemma |
| C．Laws concerning patent protection |
| D．Popular pills of Pfizer |