Ordinary Road 2010

On the same day, Kuaidu announced a new round of marketing activities in Lin'an. At the same time, it upgraded the subsidy rate for two orders per day to 11 yuan, which is higher than the current policy of Wanli Travel and Tudu Taxi, and provided [-] opportunities for free orders per day.

Kuaidu Taxi must have imagined that his behavior of actively increasing the price would cause a chain reaction of the other two companies, so he added a special explanation:

"No matter how much subsidy each order is paid by peer companies, Kuaidu Taxi will always be one yuan higher than them."

In the first round of the subsidy battle a year ago, the one who suffered the most was Kuaidu, who was not only overtaken by Wanli Travel, but also widened the gap with the first two.

Obviously this time they announced three days late, not because they were half a beat too late, but because they were fully prepared.

When the media asked how much budget Kuaidu and Zhifubao had prepared for this event, Chen Weixing, who was in charge of the announcement, replied confidently:

"No capping!"

This sentence seems to be a clarion call to charge, representing the determination of Kuaido and the A factory behind it to never give up until it reaches its goal.

Kuaidu’s statement also re-ignited the subsidy war in the taxi-hailing industry. The topic that was suspended due to the interruption of the Spring Festival holiday was brought up.

Although Wanli Travel, which was the first to do it years ago and received the most benefits, has not yet responded, but their subsidy policy has not been cancelled, even during the Chinese New Year!

All of a sudden, discussions about this "money burning war" were raging, and it even became a topic of widespread discussion in society beyond the economic field. People began to use "crazy" to describe everything that was happening.

Experts from all walks of life expressed their opinions one after another, some of them were closely related to the incident itself, the development process of the popular science online car-hailing industry, and the main situation of several companies at present.

There is also a higher pattern, focusing on the respective mobile strategies of the three BAT behind them and the layout and competition in the O2O field.

There are also media reports that due to the high subsidies of taxi-hailing software, taxi drivers in major large and medium-sized cities across the country are almost wiped out, forming a situation of "non-network taxi-hailing orders not being accepted", resulting in ordinary taxi drivers who do not know how to use taxi-hailing software. Citizens have actually lost the ability to hail a taxi.

As the saying goes, laymen watch the fun, and experts watch the doorway.

In the midst of the turmoil, Lin Yi’s concern is that, as he said at the beginning, what the price of Kuaidu Taxi brings is that everyone focuses on the upgrade of the subsidy, rather than red envelopes or other forms of distribution. superior.

Consumers are still very practical, maintaining a high degree of rationality of "whoever gives more money will use it", and has no special "brand loyalty" to any company.

In other words, Dudu's red envelope promotion strategy did not achieve its purpose.

The remaining things are very simple and brutal, returning to the original old road, just like the easiest and most exciting kind of gambling:

Than size.

On the contrary, Lin Yi felt fortunate, because what he was worried about now was what kind of tricks Dudu and Kuaidu could come up with, and he was not too worried about the amount of money.

Of course, it's not that the funds for Wanli Travel are more abundant than the other two, but that he knew early on that this method alone would not be able to tell the winner.

Chapter 420

"How are you going to deal with Kuaidu's price increase to 11 yuan, and increase it to 12 yuan?"

It was Li Luobin who was asking the question. He was still able to hold his breath with the Dudu's 10 billion yuan before, but when the Kuaidu said "there is no cap", he called Lin Yi to discuss it again.

For Li Robin, of course he hopes that Wanli Travel can maintain the No.1 advantage in the industry, and he is willing to pay a certain price for this, as evidenced by the previous several times he paid Lin Yi.

But once it exceeds the appropriate range, when the price becomes unbearable, even Xiongchang has to make another plan.

Li Luobin has to admit that after so many years in this industry, even he has to say in the current situation:

I have not seen.

"As soon as we bid 11 yuan, we will bid 12 yuan, and then we will bid 13 yuan? I don't think it makes much sense to increase the price layer by layer. It's like an auction."

"And Kuaidu obviously thought that we would increase the price accordingly, so he specifically said that it will always be one dollar higher than the competition."

"Of course we won't be afraid of him, but we have to be aware of one thing, that is, among Wanli, Dudu and Kuaidu, Kuaidu's willingness to continue fighting is the strongest now."

"Because before, Wanli Travel got the biggest piece of cake, followed by Dudu, and Kuaidu's result was the smallest. If it were me, I would definitely not want to let it go."

"In other words, the willingness to continue to subsidize Wanli Travel is the smallest now, but only if you can fight can you make peace. Only when your opponent finds that they can't get what they want through the subsidy war will they have any plans to stop."

"That day shouldn't be too far away."

This conclusion came suddenly. Although Li Robin also wanted to see it, he would not believe it lightly:

“How come you see?”

Lin Yi replied: "The taxi industry is a non-renewable resource that relies on license plate operations. The total number of vehicles in the country is about 100 million to 110 million, and there has been almost no significant increase in the past few years."

"Whether it's traveling thousands of miles, or Dudu Kuaidu, you can only cut the cake in this, because they can't conjure up more taxis out of thin air."

"Don't look at the promotion budgets of several companies from 1 million, 2 million, 5 million, and 10 billion. Now they are calling out whether there is no cap, but this foundation cannot be changed."

"Although the growth brought about by this subsidy war is extremely exaggerated, and the largest order size of Wanli Travel has reached 50 times that before it started, I have been observing the limits of this industry."

"Originally, a normal industry may take several years to develop to this level, but the ride-hailing industry is approaching that limit at an unprecedented speed under the ripening of large sums of money."

"Robin, we internally estimate that the number of registered drivers of Wanli Chuxing will reach 100 million by the end of this month. Of course, they can also register repeatedly on Dudu and Kuaidu, but how much room do you think there is for future growth?"

"Actually, as far as I know, many taxi drivers now take turns using three taxi-hailing apps after they get out of the car. Each company takes 10 orders, and after receiving the rewards of the day, they switch to another one, and this is repeated."

"Before the emergence of taxi-hailing software, taxi drivers only ran 20-30 trips per shift. Even if we reduced the empty driving rate and increased his effective driving time, he would only be able to run [-] trips a day."

"In other words, it doesn't make much sense for us to rob again."

These words sounded reasonable, and Li Robin's eyes lit up: "You mean, this subsidy war will end soon?"

"It will definitely end, it's hard to say soon."

Lin Yi gave his own judgment, "Based on the inference just now, the specific time period will end depends on when Kuaidi Taxi discovers and accepts their subsidy, and it won't help."

Li Luobin is digesting these theories. What he is most worried about is that the taxi-hailing industry has become a bottomless pit that requires continuous investment and blood loss, but Lin Yi's words give him hope of ending.

He felt even more satisfied with Lin Yi. While others were still watching how this subsidy war could not be handed over, Lin Yi was thinking about how to end it.

At the same time, Li Luobin also had an idea in his mind: If the limited taxi resources have been developed, doesn’t it mean that the online car-hailing industry will have nowhere to go?

He didn't throw this question out. The future of the online car-hailing industry is an issue that Lin Yi has to consider, and it's not his turn and Xiongchang's turn yet.

After Li Luobin's worries were dispelled for the time being, he still had to face the real problem: "In your opinion, how should Kuaidu respond to this price increase?"

"We also want to increase the price, and we can only increase the price. But we can't follow the rhythm of the other party, we have to follow our own method."

Lin Yi's idea is of course also ready-made: "If we announce the increase to 12 yuan tomorrow, I'm sure Kuaidu will increase it to 13 yuan the day after tomorrow, so there will be no end."

"We have to come up with a way that the other party can't follow up, for example, a random amount between 12-20 yuan."

"random?"

Li Luobin touched the idea for a while, and found that it seemed to work, and then thought about it again, feeling a little familiar.

Isn't this the red envelope given by the goose factory during the Chinese New Year?

It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter where the inspiration comes from, as long as it works.

"However, if the subsidy is increased to 12-20 yuan at once, the subsidy cost will be even higher?"

Lin Yi told him another fact: "Users feel very fresh about our subsidy of 11 and 12 yuan, so they will swing left and right."

"But they will soon find out that it doesn't really make any difference whether it's $11 or $12."

"The reason why we set the subsidy amount at 10 yuan at the beginning was not entirely to make up an integer for auspiciousness, but to represent that the itinerary within the starting price is completely free."

"According to our calculations, such short trips are the most common among the most frequent commutes."

"That is to say, if you only spend 10 yuan in total for this taxi, what's the point of subsidizing 11 yuan or 12 yuan?"

"This is also my dislike of Kuaidi Taxi's attempt to regain a city by increasing fares."

To put it bluntly, the subsidy war has developed to the current stage and has entered a stage of "all employees are irrational".

People who take taxis have lost the reason to judge whether they can use such a high subsidy, and the temptation of "free taxis" has caused a lot of extra demand.

This is even more true for Wanli travel, tuk-tuk taxis and Kuaidu taxis. They are like red-eyed gamblers. They have no way of distinguishing whether their investment can bring back enough returns. There is only one thought in their minds:

Can't lose!

The most detached player in this "game of cowards" is BAT. They paid the three companies to fight a "proxy war", thinking that everything was under control, but the situation gradually got out of control.

In the end, Wanli, Dudu and Kuaidu are life and death, and BAT is also in the same situation because of the face of the Big Three:

out on a limb.

Chapter 421 Please, Brother Ma

Li Robin still paid.

Although Lin Yi predicted to him the end of this subsidy war, in fact, the current daily subsidy expenditure is still increasing, and has already crossed the eight-figure threshold.

Under such circumstances, the US$1.2 million raised by Wanli Travel in the last round of financing, even if it is divided into half and half with Xiongchang, is not so safe.

Not to mention Li Luobin's side, Lin Yi even ran to his other benefactor Liu Jianni to say hello.

Although Liu Jianni has never seen such a scene, at least she is very clear about the situation in front of her:

"No one wants to burn money, but if I have to, I can accept the reality. Giving up now is obviously tantamount to wasting all previous efforts."

"Everyone is riding a tiger. Once we stop subsidies and the other two continue to subsidize, the time for Wanli Travel to lose users and exit the market can be calculated in days."

"The shareholding structure of Wanli Travel is also very simple. Besides us, there is only Xiongchang, so Lin Yi, you can rest assured."

Liu Jianni gave him a reassurance: "As long as Xiongchang continues to invest, I will dare to follow."

With the current speed of burning money, it is impossible for new investors to come in, and Lin Yi has no time to go out to find them.

But with these two guarantees, he can at least be sure that even if the development of the situation is not as expected, at least he will not face the crisis of food shortage soon.

Then a funny thing happened.

On the second day after Kuaidi Taxi announced that the subsidy would be increased to 11 yuan, Wanli Travel announced that it would be adjusted to a random amount between 12-20 yuan.

But it was not their family. At almost the same time, Tutu Taxi also announced almost the same policy, which surprised outsiders.

This is of course, because Lin Yi is a copycat, he copied the tactics of the goose factory.

But other people don't know, even a large number of uninformed employees in the two companies have a question:

Is it negotiated?

The one that was most shaken was the Kuaidu Taxi in Lin’an. Compared with the random amount of response, they were more concerned about whether the same method of Wanli Travel and Tudu Taxi was a coincidence or premeditated?

Lin Yi didn't know what speculation the outside world had about this, but he met an unexpected person because of this, and it was proposed by the other party.

The person who invited him was Liu Chiping from Goose Factory, but the person who met him was not.

It is the legendary Pony.

Brother Xiao Ma's appearance was pretty when he was young, but now he is a little richer. Compared with Li Robin, he can only be said to be quite satisfactory.

Of course, it would be a bit too bullying to compare appearance with Ma Jack.

Brother Xiao Ma's accent is very interesting, a typical southerner with a flat tongue and no distinction between pronunciation.However, his attitude is still approachable, and he doesn't put on the airs of a big boss.

"Lin Yi, right? I asked Martin to ask you out. He had other arrangements to go abroad, so he didn't come here today."

Martin is Liu Chiping.

Brother Xiao Ma didn't introduce himself. After all, if you don't even know this person, you don't need to be in this industry.

The two got to know each other briefly, and then brother Ma said:

"The amount of red envelopes before 12-20 yuan in Tudu Taxi is actually what I thought. According to Goose Factory's many years of game operation experience, adding a little uncertainty will increase users' interest."

"However, I found out that Wanli Travel actually came up with the same method. I happened to be in the capital today to talk about something, so I asked Martin to find you out and see what you came up with."

Lin Yi knew that his cards were not enough, and Brother Xiao Ma made a special trip, so it was very important to meet him by the way.

"Martin mentioned you to me before, and said that Wanli Travel had approached us when it was first launched, but because Goose Factory had already subscribed for a tuk-tuk taxi, he missed this fate."

"I think it's not too late for us to know each other now, you don't mind talking to me, do you?"

Goose Factory is now the main backstage of Dudu Taxi, and based on the competitive relationship between Wanli Chuxing and Tudu Taxi, the two parties are obviously enemies rather than friends.

But if Lin Yi regards Xiao Ma as an opponent, it is obviously a bit self-indulgent, and Li Luobin is about the same.

"Of course, in fact, I also think it's very coincidental. I didn't expect that we would actually consider going together. In fact, this idea was also inspired by the red envelopes of Goose Factory."

Of course Lin Yi would not say that he just copied his idea.

Although it sounds very coincidental, Brother Xiao Ma also accepted it. After all, the occurrence of small probability events is also possible, otherwise there is no other scientific explanation.

But he came today not only to prove this: "Lin Yi, what do you think of the future development of this subsidy war?"

"I didn't come here today to meet Cheng Wei, and I didn't tell him about meeting you, so you can speak freely."

Lin Yi thought about it quickly. The Goose Factory definitely didn't suddenly change his mind and wanted to travel thousands of miles. Brother Xiao Ma certainly didn't want to talk about life and ideals with him, so what is his actual purpose?

Persuade a fight.