Destruction and opportunity: what are the subversion in the 2014?

Foreign media recently wrote a large inventory of the 2014 industry subversive. The article said, this year is a variety of traditional business models are generally subversive year, the new forces in the destruction of the original order of the industry, but also to consumers, subversion itself and other enterprises to bring great opportunities. Companies that are known to be subversive include Tesla, Uber, Alibaba, millet, lending Club, Netflix and other well-known technology companies, and some less famous startups.

The following are the main contents of the article:

Industry insiders believe that 2014 is the "subversive" in the global subversion of various traditional business models of the year.

As technology has brought new tools into the hands of innovators, the traditional boundaries between industries are crumbling. Amazon has changed book sales to various other retail categories and is now experimenting with the delivery of unmanned aircraft. Apple has caused huge swings in the music industry and telecoms, and is now involved in the design and development of the watch. Airbnb 6 years later, it offers more rooms than IHG and Hilton, the world's two largest hotel groups.

Of course, innovation is as old as time. There is no difference between subversive businesses and the people who create them. "If I ask the client what they want, they say they want a faster horse." "Henry Ford said before the introduction of VW cars to subvert the entire car market.

What is now different from the past is the range and number of individuals and businesses that have subverted the original business model around the world. Whether it's the social media that forces the news industry to restructure, or the technological advances that have changed the way people order clothes, watch movies or take taxis, or make it easier for retailers to sell cheaper goods, the subversive is pervasive.

Subversion is often destructive, forcing businesses to fail, leaving people with jobs. However, with the emergence of new technologies such as the public and large data mining, subversion will also bring great opportunities to consumers, the subversive themselves and other enterprises.

There are a few companies that call the industry subversive, including Tesla, Uber, Alibaba, millet, lending Club, Netflix and other well-known companies. Let's take stock of 7 of them:

1. Uber: Subversion of the taxi market

The Uber of Trevis Kalanik (Travis Kalanick) has had a huge impact on taxi companies and other cab applications, but its subversion has also led to successive foes.

For Uber, this is the year it has completed billions of of billions of dollars in funding, banned from operations and expanded aggressively in several cities around the world. The taxi service has become synonymous with the subversive power of Silicon Valley.

The company, which has been established for 5 years, has completely changed the taxi market without a car. It has entered 51 countries in the world and has served in more than 230 cities. It uses its smartphone to dock the drivers and passengers of private cars and taxis, with the support of a "big data" team that ensures that consumers who want to take a taxi are no more than 5 minutes away from a single driver.

Under Kalanik's leadership, Uber has had a huge impact on other startups and taxi companies that offer taxis or carpool services. In the new round of financing in December, it received 1.2 billion dollars in financing, valued at 40 billion U.S. dollars.

These funds allow it to reduce service costs and grab more market share from competitive applications and taxi companies. Its popularity has led to a two-thirds drop in the number of taxi rides in San Francisco in just two years. The London Taxi application Hailo also withdrew from the North American market because of its inability to resist Uber's pricing strategy.

Some Uber drivers also complain that they have to extend their working hours to make as much money as their pricing declines.

The Uber attack began to heat up. Regulators, particularly in Europe, have begun to investigate the company's operations. At the same time, Uber sometimes in the self subversion, successive mistakes. One of its executives said in November that Uber should hire investigators to dig up the "private life" scandal that criticized Uber journalists. The comments immediately sparked a wave of criticism.

The incident has left many wondering whether the company's corporate culture will be its Achilles heel.

Faced with the resistance of taxi drivers, Uber will launch a political lobbying effort to expand into more cities, Kalanik said. To this end, in August he hired U.S. President Barack Obama, former advisor David Pros (David Plouffe) as policy director.

"I don't agree with the idea that Uber has an image problem. Profie told the Financial Times, "What I think is that when you're a subversive, you're a target." ”

Uber is not content with just fighting the taxi industry on the road to a 10 billion dollar revenue target next year. From transporting hamburgers in Beirut to hiring a bicycle courier in New York, and then to launching a cat door-to-door service in Seattle, it is already outside the pilot's transportation service.

2. Alibaba

Outside the retail industry, Alibaba is also planning to change other industries, including financial services.

Its Taobao deal, which is close to $300 billion trillion in the first half of this year, could be said to have changed the Chinese retail industry.

But now, the company and its rivals are moving into industries ranging from taxis to financial services.

Alibaba investment quick taxi increased people's taxi efficiency, the balance treasure as of the end of September this year also reached the scale of 534 billion yuan.

Tsai, vice chairman of the company, told the Financial Times in November that financial and health-care services were a huge industry in which technology could change, as part of the industry's model was outdated.

But he admits that the company's move into the state-run service sector has not been as smooth as they hoped. He admits that plans to launch a virtual credit card project this spring have been halted by the central bank and that the company's plans to expand into the financial services market have been "frustrated".

"The central bank is obviously saying, ' Let's slow down a little bit and let us understand what these innovations are all about, and let us bring about change rather than subversion, '" Chua said. ’”

3. Diamond: Targeting the African market

Diamond (Bob Diamond) may not have subverted a particular market or industry, but he has launched a strong challenge to the traditional view that investment in sub-Saharan Africa cannot make money.

Diamond left Barclays in 2012 after being fined for manipulating London interbank lending rates (Libor). Since then, he has raised more than 600 million dollars on the London Stock Exchange to invest in African banks through his Atlas Mara company.

While there is a new wave of other investors on the African continent, including KKR, Carlyle and other private-equity firms, including Dubai investment firms and Singapore Temasek Holdings, the Diamond is arguably one of the region's most famous investors.

"Wall Street investors have chosen to invest in Africa solely because of him," said one investment banker who specialises in the African market. He has a high profile. ”

In December 2013, Diamond financed 325 million of billions of dollars by offering an IPO in London. The US banker collaborated with Mara Group founder Ashish Tacar (Ashish Thakkar), a large conglomerate that covers 19 African countries.

Atlas Mara has reached 3 deals in Africa and will operate in countries including Botswana, Mozambique and Tanzania. Diamond has higher expectations for the future. "International banks that have not yet entered Africa have no regard for the region at all." That's great, that's the core reason we're involved in the market. "He told the Financial Times in November.

4. Aldi: Subversion of the grocery market

The two discount stores in Germany, Aldi and Lidl, are subverting the world's grocery market – from the heartland of Europe to the UK, the US and Australia. Aldi is even exploring the Chinese market.

In the UK, Aldi and Lidl have almost doubled their market share over the past 4 years. During the same period, the market share of Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury and William Morrison of the four supermarkets all showed a decline.

Aldi has opened 1350 stores in the United States and plans to raise the figure to 2000 by 2018. Lidl is also poised to enter the U.S. market, bringing further challenges to supermarket giants such as Wal-Mart.

Mike Paglia, Kantar Retail director, Maik Paglia that if Lidl arrives, traditional retailers will face greater competition, especially since it sells more branded goods than Aldi. "I think when Lidl arrives, it will cause panic in Wal-Mart," he said. ”

Lidl's parent Schwarz group is already Europe's largest food retailer, with sales of 81.7 billion euros in 2013 (VAT), according to Planet Retail, an advisory body. Aldi's total global sales last year also reached € 67.4 billion.

But traditional retailers are also attacking. In the UK, the four supermarket intend to spend billions of of pounds to reduce commodity prices; In the US, supermarket chains such as Wal-Mart are also setting up large numbers of small shops.

For the moment, there are signs that the growth of Aldi and Lidl has slowed in the UK, but they are already two strong forces in the global grocery market and are unlikely to turn back into small roles.

5. Ford: A revolutionary step by making a best-selling car with aluminum

When Ford entered the market in November, when the first redesign of the country's best-selling F-150, it did not look revolutionary.

However, the car's body is made of aluminum. You know, there has never been a vendor applying the metal to such a high production model.

This shift in the material has reduced the vehicle's weight by 700 lbs (about 13%), reducing fuel consumption by 5% to 22% compared to the original F-150 model. The specific percentage of savings depends on the model.

After visiting Ford's factory in Dearborn, Michigan, the reporter realized that the company's transformation was at a great risk: it had to replace the arc-welding facility, replacing it entirely with a new machine.

This means a high risk, after all, according to some analysts estimate F-150 's operating profit contribution ratio as high as 90%. AutoTrader.com analyst Michel Cribbs (Michelle Krebs) said, "This is a huge change." Aluminium has previously been used in automobiles, but it has been used much less than Ford. ”

Ford hopes to gain a competitive advantage through this decisive step. Its bold innovation history dates back to the modern manufacturing technology invented by founder Henry Ford 100 years ago.

GM and Chrysler are also expected to redesign their models to meet stringent new fuel efficiency standards, the company said. The first manufacturer to successfully complete the transition may be able to lay a long-term market dominance.

6. Ethically Eat: Subversion of the online call meal market

David Buttress, CEO of ethically Eat, described himself as an "anti-cook," who wanted to make people who didn't have the time to cook their own meals and instead go to their catering applications and the website to order takeout.

The UK's largest restaurant service provider was founded in Denmark in 2001 and moved to the UK after 5 years. Now it has changed the way people call meals in markets such as Britain. It serves as a middleman for thousands of restaurants and consumers who want to choose restaurants on one-stop platforms.

In 2013, ethically eat processed orders of more than 40 million, which charged a 10% commission for each order and achieved sales of £ 96.8 million a year.

For years, it has relied on wind investment to achieve growth. This April, ethically eat a successful IPO, valuing about £ 1.5 billion.

Soon after its IPO, the company unfortunately became one of the most disappointing new listings, with shares at a price below 260 pence for several consecutive months. However, its share price is now over 300 pence, and its August earnings show that its revenue for the first half of the year was 69.8 million pounds, up 60% per cent year-on-year.

Ethically Eat's services have covered 13 countries, including Brazil, India and Canada, but Britain's 5 billion-pound restaurant market is still its main source of revenue, contributing almost all of its profits. Globally, more than 40,000 restaurants have been stationed in its applications and websites. They all need to pay the ethically eat the cost of entry.

Some analysts are sceptical about the prospect of ethically eat, thinking that its business model can easily replicate for other companies. Given that Amazon is experimenting with Seattle, ethically Eat's cake is likely to be eroded by US tech giants in the future.

7. Aereo

Aereo the little subversive is no longer able to subvert the market. Founded in 2012, the New York start-up company's 8 to 12 dollar service allows users to transmit high-definition live TV signals to their smartphones, tablets, laptops and networked televisions. It financed nearly 100 million dollars, mainly from the IAC Diller (Barry Diller). It wants to challenge the traditional TV business model.

"We know there is a demand for this kind of service," Chet Canoga Chet Kanojia, Aereo's CEO, told the Financial Times. We don't know if this demand is 30%, 5% or 2% of the market, but even if it is 5%, it will be a big business. ”

However, the size of the Aereo antenna device has sparked objections from mainstream broadcasters, including ABC, NBC and Forks. The business models of these companies have changed in recent years because they have been able to charge a growing amount of playback fees to pay-TV providers. And Aereo threatens their "broadcast" costs, which, according to SNL Kagan, are estimated to reach $4 billion a year.

The television networks have joined the courts in calling for the closure of the Aereo, claiming that the service broadcasts television signals without authorization, thereby infringing on their copyrights. Aereo countered that it offers more convenient services based on the rabbit ear antenna than traditional services.

In June, the Supreme Court ruled that Aereo was losing its service. IAC then made a 66.6 million dollar write-downs on its investments, Aereo filed for bankruptcy protection in November.

In a letter to consumers, Canoga said the legal and regulatory challenges were "too difficult to overcome", but pointed out that his company "promoted the development of the industry and helped to bring positive changes to consumers." ”

Aereo has never disclosed its revenue data, but documents show that it has only over 77,000 subscribers in 2013 years. Les Muenvis, the CBS CEO, said the service had "caused great concern, but not many people actually used it". (Translator: Lebang)

(Responsible editor: Lvguang)