Why startups focus on the platform without focusing on the product

Happy mummy Financing 50 million, users 20,000, Tao Jianhui said "We want to do platform";

Sugar nurses in the announcement of financing, the release of the second generation of products also said to do hardware platform;

Spring Rain doctor early proposed to access Third-party hardware data, to do hardware platform.

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There are countless news stories about platforms. Even at an entrepreneur-sharing meeting, a start-up company is talking about the future of its products, and the following VCs comment: "What do you do for a platform?" Visible all sides make platform of the voice is very high. Why is that?

Internet start-up Companies

A VC industry told Lei Feng Net, he felt VC keen to do pioneering company platform because "from the angle of the venture, is looking forward to the company has a huge growth space", but "ambition is good, puny is bad, finally can do or step by step to the last thing".

Why shouldn't startups focus on doing a good job? such as the fetal language of happy mummy and sugar nurse's blood glucose meter. He said:

"VCs are mainly the growth of investment enterprises, if only cash flow is generated, but the lack of growth, it is more like a traditional business; If you can make a bomb, an extreme example is the ipod and the iphone, and of course, it's worth investing in, especially the phone, which naturally forms a platform and even a portal, One of the big wishes for a new VR is that some people think that VR is a mobile-like entry in the future, while others think it's more like the next Xbox-like gaming device. ”

To sum up, it means that VCs are investing in internet start-ups, not a traditional business.

Data

For smart hardware startups, they're different from traditional hardware in terms of the value of their data. Smart hardware collects large amounts of data, and data mining will become a big business in the future. However, most startups have low sales and very little activity, so they come up with a way to access third party hardware and collect more data from them.

Dirty the dirty work to someone else

Whether it is hardware or content, are capital and labor-intensive business, and to do a good job is not easy, belongs to the "dirty living dirty." A lot of smart hardware startups, products do not want to do a platform, products do a good job more want to do platform, for them hardware is just a tool to circle users. Platform is a very light product, but also easy to profit, by contrast, hard hardware or give someone else to do it.

Lap users, high barriers

"Platform of high Barriers," Tao Jianhui before the Lei Feng Net interview said, "If only the hardware products, it is easy to be imitated by competitors, made platform can have their own ecology, will be tightly glued users." ”

He takes Tencent and Ali as examples, with the former socializing and the latter as an almost unbreakable platform. Most startups want to be a gateway to a niche, circle a group of users, and think about how they can be used to cash in.