The Nature of Platform Enterprises: Capital Intensity and Becoming the Essential Entry Point

打开手机, there are only a handful of entry points. No one's going to install 10,000 apps on their phone—they won't. You only use five or six regularly. And so, the slots for internet giants are also limited to just a handful. These big internet companies are essentially telecom, broadcasting, and carriers in a new technological era.

To become an operator, you need to burn money and you need the right timing.

For platforms in the early stage, the most important thing isn't technology—it's customer acquisition. You can acquire customers by subsidizing; you quickly gain hundreds of millions of users, and you become a national platform.