In recent times, the heat of Meituan has been a bit high. Some time ago, the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Human Resources and Social Security Deputy Director Wang Lin ran a day of Meituan takeaway, "complained" that "a day of work for 12 hours, sent 5 single, earned 41 dollars, this money is too bad." Recently, Mr. Wang, the director of the inspection team with the company representatives of the United States group to have a dialog.

In the conversation, we noticed that the representative of Meituan said that the current Meituan platform is close to 10 million registered delivery workers, and Meituan only belongs to the outsourcing relationship. 3 yuan / day of commercial insurance is still deducted from the rider's commission, and the subsequent rider if there is a problem, are covered by commercial insurance. It is not difficult to see, Meituan for this close to 10 million riders, has long set aside the responsibility. But in fact, the Mission's "squeeze" on riders may not be the only thing.

Not long ago, a Peking University doctor also broke the news that he had run a takeaway period of experience. The doctor spent five months investigating, and at the beginning, the doctor praised the platform's management of hundreds of thousands of riders. But as the time of delivery gradually increased, the doctor also found some problems. The core of the problem is that the platform is not only through big data algorithms to improve efficiency, but also trying to "squeeze" the "residual value" of the delivery riders.

How can a delivery platform "squeeze" riders through big data?

According to the Peking University doctor, the takeout platform holds a lot of data, and then uses the data to plan the time for the delivery of food, as well as the pricing of each order. With such a huge amount of data, it's natural to have a system with precise algorithms so that all the details can be accounted for, which in turn leads to a high degree of control and accurate predictions.

Simply put, the platform relies on big data to help riders take orders, but the question arises, is the platform really just so kind? After all, the platform is to profit for the purpose, that is to say, the platform continues to improve the efficiency of the rider's behavior, and not just to let the rider earn more money, the more critical is to make their own pockets have to be drummed up to do.

In order to achieve this purpose, the platform naturally in the algorithm of some so-called "optimization". According to Dr. Peking University, "takeaway platforms are never satisfied with compressing delivery time, and they are always trying to test the limits of human beings." And he gave an example.

Previously, when a takeaway rider went to the NPC Zhixing Apartment Building to deliver a takeaway, he could only choose to enter through the north door, so the system calculated the delivery time, using the north door as the basis for measurement, and it took about 4 minutes. However, some riders then sent a shortcut, so that the delivery time of this order became generous. So the rider would use the time saved to run the next order. But after a lot of riders did this, the platform actually shortened the order time accordingly, like "fixing the bugs like a patch".

From this wave of operation, big data as a user-friendly, improve the efficiency of the initial product of the rider, but ultimately turned into a platform to "squeeze" the rider "residual value" of the tool, is really hard to accept. Of course, the technology itself is not guilty, the key is to look at the use of this technology business or platform for what purpose? If it's "in the eye of the beholder", then it's the riders on the platform who are hurt, and the merchants who are hurt.

Big data has an impact on the percentage of the platform's drawbacks

In fact, in addition to "squeezing" riders through big data, the platform will also analyze the drawbacks through the relevant algorithms. For example, some time ago, frequently protested by the merchants of Meituan takeaway. Last year, the Guangdong Catering Association has issued an article accusing the United States of "high commission" behavior, the large chain restaurants to implement 18% commission; on the small restaurant implementation of 23% or so.

In the eyes of outsiders, perhaps 20% or so of the commission is not high, but catering itself is a thin profit industry, unless you will set the unit price very high, but consumers are not fools, once the price is too high, the flow of natural will follow the decline. But "wool comes out of the sheep's body" on, if the merchants do not rely on price increases to fill the vacancy of high commission, then only to reduce the cost of this road, or who will lose money to do business?

And big data in the platform to develop the percentage of draw, indeed, also played a decisive factor. After all, this commission is by no means said to rely on pat on the head to set out, but built on the analysis of big data. According to a big brother on the know-how, the commission is actually based on the algorithm of the "Meituan brain". The "Mission Brain" is a catering entertainment knowledge graph built by the Mission, which can be combined with the scientific calculation of big data through artificial intelligence to achieve a more intelligent operation.

And, the percentage of the draw will be constantly updated as time progresses and data is iterated. But here there is a problem worth exploring, although big data can help platforms to solve the problem of drawback formulation, but this is entirely from the perspective of platform interests, and does not take into account the acceptability of the merchant.

Of course, we can also understand the operation of the Mission, after all, in the Mission's financial report last year, the takeaway business revenue still accounted for more than 50% of the total business revenue. So in the short term, the situation of high commission commission may continue. Of course, the reason why Meituan dares to decide its own drawback, in addition to the big data advantage, there is also its absolute monopoly in the takeaway market.

Surveyed for suspected "two choices", the stock price fell

For Meituan's position in the takeout industry, previous data show that the market share has exceeded 70%, especially the ecosystem established by Meituan, for merchants, the temptation is very great. The temptation is very great. And Meituan can have such a high flow, mainly due to the high investment in the early stage.

During the subsidy war in the takeout market, Meituan invested a lot of capital to subsidize users and merchants. For example, a 30 yuan bento, Meituan may subsidize 5 yuan for the user's meal, so that the user can buy the bento for only 25 yuan. At the same time, Meituan has to subsidize the merchants, support merchants merchants, in order to enhance the activity on the platform.

In fact, because of the giant's preferential indeed attracted a large number of users to become a member of the Meituan takeaway, and the high traffic flow brought by the users also attracted more merchants, so like a "snowball", Meituan's market share is also getting bigger and bigger. But in the process of continuous subsidization, the loss of Meituan is also increasing. And when the group became an oligopoly in the industry, it began to intensify its efforts to start plundering the market resources to fill the previous subsidy shortfall.

At the same time, Meituan also has to face the threat of competitors, so in order to further combat competitors, so that its complete lack of ability to resist, Meituan before this also secretly engaged in the "choose one" strategy, that is, to allow merchants from the Meituan and Hungry Mou platform to choose one of them to be stationed. In this way, merchants in order to expand online business, will have to yield to the United States group. Because if the merchants insist on not compromising, then the Mission will reduce the search rankings and other means to limit the amount of "disobedient" merchants recommended.

However, some time ago, the relevant departments have begun to carry out the investigation of the United States group "two choices", for the antitrust investigation, and even the media reported that the fine can be up to 12 billion. For Meituan, this is not a good thing. Especially according to this period of observation, as of 5 and 10, the United States Mission shares have suffered a "nine consecutive decline", the share price compared to this year's peak has slipped 44%, the market value of the evaporation of 1 trillion yuan.

Write in the end

It can be said that the antitrust investigation of the United States is quite a heavy blow, especially in our view, the takeaway business is the core business of the United States group, if the main business encountered setbacks, will inevitably be on the revenue as well as a certain impact on profits. In this way, Meituan is likely to fall into a bigger crisis. After all, from the current point of view, Meituan in the new business is still in the stage of continuous "burning money", if the takeaway business can not hold, then this year's loss is certainly a nail in the coffin, is not sure how much patience investors have left for Meituan?