On October 22, Chairman and CEO of Innovation Works, Li Kaifu, released 10 posts interpreting the trends of the mobile internet. Li Kaifu expects that the potential opportunities in mobile internet will be 14 times that of PC internet, and advises entrepreneurs to take user pain points as an opportunity for entrepreneurship, avoid the core areas of giants but not be overly fearful.
Li Kaifu posted the key points of his speech at the Mobile Internet Conference on Weibo, pointing out that there are now 300 million computer users in China using their computers for 3 hours daily; whereas there are 800 million mobile phone users in China using their phones for 16 hours daily. "Therefore, the potential opportunities in mobile internet are 14 times that of PC internet."
Li Kaifu discussed mobile internet on Weibo: "The mobile phone will replace the PC as the personal information center." The reasons he listed were: 1. It's cheaper and more convenient than a PC. 2. It creates value during fragmented time. 3. It can be carried around all day. 4. There are richer interaction methods - touch, compass, voice, and camera. 5. The convenience of mobile payments - greater consumption potential. 6. More people are willing to store personal information on their mobile phones. 7. Geographical information adds value.
Regarding the challenges of the development of the mobile internet ecosystem, Li Kaifu summarized them as: smartphones are too expensive, there is a lack of good local software (not enough developers), and 3G fees are too expensive and it's hard to lower them.
Li Kaifu believes that the three major driving forces to overcome the challenges of mobile internet are: 1. The rise of smartphones priced at a thousand yuan (inevitable consequence of horizontal industry integration). 2. Diversification of product distribution channels (besides historical SP+mobile, there are now three operators, plus internet distribution channels). 3. Diversification of payment channels (developers could only get 30-40% during the SP era, but with the use of the father of the internet, developers can get >90%).
The three major opportunities to break through the challenges of mobile internet are: 1. A huge market gap (the PC software market has already become relatively saturated, but the mobile phone software market only has a few popular products). 2. The beginning of a merger wave (Google, Apple, DeNA, even Baidu and Tencent are acquiring companies, which brings promotion space and also verifies the existence of opportunities). 3. Development costs have reached a new low (open source, cloud computing, online stores).
Li Kaifu indicated that from the PC era, we can learn that network services are the biggest opportunity, the value of internet giants is greater than software giants, greater than chip manufacturers, greater than hardware manufacturers, and mobile internet will be the same, so the biggest opportunity lies in creating service value in mobile internet.
For mobile internet, Li Kaifu made seven predictions: 1. The WAP era has passed, welcoming the true mobile internet era. 2. The price of full-function Android phones will drop to 1500 yuan this year, and to 750 yuan next year. 3. Bandwidth is difficult to reduce in price, so optimize rich clients + minimize bandwidth. 4. Entertainment + social applications will dominate the Chinese mobile internet market. 5. Network market pre-paid models will be replaced by localized fee models. 6. Industry revenue will grow several times within three years: from charging users 5 yuan per game, to users actively paying 50 yuan monthly. 7. Future users will polarize: high-end users use their phones as fragmented time tools, grassroots users' entire network behavior is based on their phones.
Li Kaifu gave four pieces of advice to entrepreneurs: avoid the core areas of giants, but don't be overly fearful; refer to the US and Japanese markets, but deeply understand the differences; don't fall in love with hot concepts, dig into real needs; take user pain points as an opportunity.