Ge Li's Profile

Great post! It’s a very unique perspective to look at Domino’s success from the digital innovation side. Before reading, I have never checked their stock pricing and it came out to be very surprising to me. I’m sure the digital innovation has been an indispensable part of Domino’s success. They have done a good job combining the technology with supply chain management. However, I wonder if what really made them successful was more because of the great supply chain on reducing delivery time (and variance) or the tracking capability of the digital platform. If we view the delivery service as a core competency of Domino’s, I would envision the supply chain being the core competency of their core competency. Undeniably I would agree the digital innovation is a great facilitator of their great supply chain management but I guess there is a paradox that success don’t come from one single factor. Still, great post! I like the new perspective you shared with us.

Great post Gaurav! It’s a very comprehensive review including the audio books and sharing platforms. Also it did not occur to me that self-publishing has eroded so much of the publishers’ market share. It’d be interesting to see the competition within the e-reading platforms. In China, there is an App called Himalaya which draws more millennials who don’t like reading actual books and spend a lot time on commuting to work towards audio books. Not only the book reading, they also developed many audio courses on soft skills using the platform and charge subscription fees per course or for membership. I have not done any research yet on how they are doing compared to e-books in China but it would be an interesting topic to look into.

I totally agree with your visions here! Especially the barriers of entry angle is amazing. Can’t seem to find more things to add to your comment. Thanks for sharing!

Great post! I like that you mentioned Airbnb is planning to target the business travellers in the next few years that I had not thought about before as a leisure traveller. You mentioned that there are very high occupancy taxes in NYC and SF. I’m very interested in learning why they impose such tax and are they applicable to hotels as well? Also something I’m interested in seeing is the competitions within the online platforms themselves. Would you think Airbnb grabbed market share from Priceline? Will they co-exist going forward or someone is going to take the entire market.

I like the visions you mentioned here and agree that the smartwatches would need to keep adding values to retain customers. I was more comparing the smartwatches to the fitness trackers as they are much more powerful and the prices are not that different. There are stats in my blog that also shows the fitness trackers got a bigger hit than the conventional watch industry. This is where I came from thinking that smartwatches are a success. Thanks for the comment!

Definitely agree. As I mentioned in a few response above, I think there are multiple factors that are affecting the swiss watch sales. However, my take is if they don’t catch up on the digital trend, they will eventually have to scale down with less market demand over the mechanical watches.

Thanks Hanif! I checked out Pebble since your introduced it and found a good one that convinced me why it failed. Here it is if you are interested. 🙂

https://www.quora.com/Why-did-Pebble-fail

Thanks Maren! I do also see the conventional watches would continue as fashion accessories on the luxury end. Maybe not the mid to low-end market though since I’ve seen a few fashion brands making good look smartwatches as accessories and compared to them, I think the mid-market conventional watches are not as attractive.

I like your vision on the seamless devices and think they would eventually replace the wearable solutions. Took a look at the article you found and I’m interested in seeing how the seamless devices develop. The example of google glass used in the article I think may not be a good representative since it’s not a very successful product, but still I like that thought!

Yes, I definitely agree that the fitness bands were hit harder than the watches and smartwatches are mainly eating up the low to mid-market watches. My take for the Swiss watches is that there are multiple factors that decreased their sales over the past few years but they are not making big enough move to catch up with the market. However, I totally agree with your points. Thanks for the comment!

I like your positivity on the outlook of the market! Thanks for the comment!

Thanks Gaurav! As we discussed today, yes I totally agree the real value-adds of smartwatches have not been that significant compared to our smartphones and the smartwatch makers would want to continue improve the feature to create value. I was more comparing it to the fitness trackers as the smartwatches are definitely more powerful and the prices are not that different for the basic versions. Further to that, I’m interested in seeing the trend of the wearable markets, which I think would be growing over the next few year. Great thoughts and thanks for the comment!

You are absolutely correct that the Swiss watches still have their true “cash cow” business holding up the company revenues [3]. Although they are losing the low margin businesses, if they could keep the luxury niche, they could still survive the digital trend. Then to your second point, I also agree that the less Millennials value the mechanical watches. Great thought if the Swiss match makers don’t add further values, they might eventually phase out. In addition to your analysis, my real concern is that the Swiss watches are losing their high-end market as well due to various reasons. They definitely need to make some stronger moves to maintain their most profitable business. It’d be interesting looking at how things would go forward. Thanks for your comment!

I agree! I think the initial criticism also came from that the smartwatches are not even as powerful as smartphones while being priced so highly compared to fitness trackers and traditional watches. However, somehow Apple managed to train the consumers to accept the prices they charge for smartwatches and began accepting this new wearable. This also makes me think that maybe Fitbit acquired so much market share because of their price positioning being $100 lower than the most basic Apple Watch. One thing I was thinking about that limits companies like Fitbit and Xiaomi is they rely on connecting their devices to smartphones, while the operating systems are controlled by Apple (iOS) and Google (Android). It’d be interesting to see how Apple or Fitbit make their next move. Thanks for the comment!

Agreed! Thanks for sharing!

In my personal opinion, having the high profile institutions on these platforms would magnify their brand equity and is less likely to result in losing their ‘star’ faculties. Having taken a course on edX, I have experienced the quality of content and known the statistics of the passing rate. The pre-made videos are of great quality and they certainly show the educational resources of the participating institutions through the courses. As I mentioned in the blog, I believe this is a good advertisement for the full-time programs at the universities. As to the professors who are teaching through these platforms, I agree it might be a good option to become a freelancer once they acquire a certain fame. However, I have not yet heard of these cases. Many professors would still prefer to pursue their tenure at these well-known universities which has better guarantee of financial incomes and resources for researches. In the long run, continuous researches is a better way to keep competency of these professors. Interesting questions to think about. Thanks for bringing them up!

Thanks for the comment! It is an interesting thought that edX could be subsidized by governmental agencies since they bring value at a societal level. I personally think it would be difficult to be subsidized by any US governmental agencies since this is a global platform. It is hard to imagine a certain State in the US would pull money to subsidize a global platform. However, it might make sense for developing countries to subsidize edX in order to have their population get easier access to education.

Very interesting post! It is the first time I’ve heard of this app and it’s great to learn how it works. I like that you brought up the difficulty of getting an appointment to see doctors for people less wealthy. This is definitely true from what I have seen in China. I am curious do you think this app would capture more rural population or urban? My initial thought is that maybe urban population would be more interested in using this app as they are busier with work and have better access to internets. I agree with your point that this app allows rural population to have access to treatments but there is a doubt in my mind that whether they would be more open to this kind of innovative platform than the urban population. Just interested in your thoughts. Great post!

It’s a very nice surprise for me to read through your blog. I have seen ads of VIPKid before but have never learned what they really do. Thanks for the very informative summary of this platform. I love your thoughts on how this platform could expand by connecting the rest of the world’s demand together.

A thought over this platform. $3000 a year converted in to CNY is not a small amount for majority of the families in China. This platform might be targeting the middle class families in China but I think with the majority of the population in China who may need a second thought on joining this platform because of the cost, it might also be beneficial if VIPKid opens courses for a few kids at the same time to lower the cost like having a “uber pool” of the classes.

Hi Gaurav,

Nice choice on TikTok! This topic is very interesting to read about. I like the numbers you included which are very informative. Also, the risks over the content control is also right on spot. There were already scandals on the pornographics in TikTok and led the App to be banned in some areas. I quickly looked up for one for your reference. https://www.dw.com/en/indonesia-blocks-pornographic-tik-tok-app/a-44537230

Some thoughts over this app based on personal experience and friends’ feedbacks:
– The challenges can become viral really quickly but the turnover is very fast as well. With so much content uploaded to the TikTok platform every day, the challenges may only last for a week or two. Ads through this platform may need to come up with a way to keep the effect lasting for the length they want.
– It can be addictive as soon as people start using it. I personally spent 3 hours per day on it during vacations. However, once I realized it is detrimental to my daily schedule and productiveness I simply cut it off. I don’t know if the others would experience the same but it can be a concern for the platform that it doesn’t retain the same active users for a long period of time.