You can ignore them, but the Internet needs them.
Editor’s note: This article is from the WeChat public account “rancaijing” (ID:rancaijing), author Liming, Edit Allen. Released with authorization.
Some time ago, the news of “Beijing SKP shopping mall bans takeaways from entering” was popularly searched, arousing public attention to the group of takeaways.
Takeaway is a profession that emerged with the rise of the Internet, and the number of similar people has become extremely large. In fact, the Internet is becoming an increasingly “labor-intensive” industry.
JD.com manages tens of thousands of delivery personnel, nearly 4 million riders are active on the Meituan food delivery platform, and Didi has recruited tens of millions of ride-hailing drivers; even the AI industry, known for its intelligence, also has a large number of Data tagger and content reviewer.
Strictly speaking, these people are not considered formal “Internet people” because they provide manual labor that is not technically compatible, and they have never stood in the center of the stage. The most glorious one was the Meituan IPO two years ago. Wang Xing invited a takeaway boy to Hong Kong to ring the bell.
But these people are indispensable, and there are people around them to develop a business. On July 10, a company called “Funhuo”, with 40,000 takeaway riders and the title of the largest domestic takeout delivery contractor, went public in the United States with a market value of US$500 million.
The business model of this company is very simple. It recruits a large group of people (takeaways, online ride-hailing drivers, shared bicycle operation and maintenance personnel, etc.) to deliver them to Meituan, Hungry, Die, etc. in the form of laborers. Companies like Di do business with giants. In essence, this is a company supported by “blue-collar” brothers.
In fact, today’s Internet can no longer leave these basic manual workers. Especially for platform companies such as Ele.me Meituan, Didi and JD.com, this group has become like hydropower.
Many times when we talk about the Internet, we always focus on tall technology, bully programmers, and glamorous office white-collar workers, while ignoring these people who contribute to the Internet. What’s more, “adding bricks and adding tiles” turned out to be a business and went public.
The Internet is becoming “labor-intensive”
“To start a business ten years ago, you only need a computer and a network cable. Now you can start a business without a computer, but you can’t live without people.” said a serial entrepreneur.
The last time he started his own business, he built a taxi-hailing platform similar to Didi, except that users were not using passenger cars, but trucks. I thought that the software was online, and it was reaping the profits, but the result was a labor-intensive project.