Last week, I went to Hangzhou, the same area as the headquarters of Alibaba, the largest online shopping network in China.
Hangzhou is known as a scenic sightseeing spot but the landscape of the city has completely changed.
Traffic control software controlled by AI (artificial intelligence) was being demonstrated in a joint effort between Alibaba and Hangzhou city.
There were not many traffic jams and there seemed to be little traffic violations.
In these fresh supermarkets financed by the Alibaba Group, 「盒馬鮮生（Hema Fresh）」there were self-checkout lanes which were exclusively for the mobile payment service “Alipay” and almost everything was unmanned.
Instead, employees put the items ordered online one after another in hand bags and are automatically carried to the storage room in the back through the rails installed on the ceiling of the store and delivered to the delivery staff.
In the past, Chinese young people often studied abroad and ended up staying in their host country for work, but in recent years many people work in their home country after returning home.
And there were many entrepreneurs from Alibaba, so it seemed like a “castle town” of Alibaba.
The rapidly growing industry in this area is using advanced technology such as, Fintech or AI (artificial intelligence), as well as mobile applications.
Having said that, I am particularly interested in is the Chinese baozi shop chain company.
This company cares not only about the workplace environment, but also the living environment of its employees. In addition the quality control is very thorough.
Due to this company only focusing on providing better service to customers, it has not expanded its franchise but is slowly expanding sales only through directly managed shops.
The boss of this company said that the essence of business is always having an advantage that other companies don’t have instead of trying to profit quickly.
This company is putting into practice three good points for different parties. (good for the seller, good for the buyer, and good for the world) which is the motto of the Omi merchants.
※The Omi merchants were one of Japan’s three largest merchants from Omi (currently Shiga prefecture) who were active from the Edo to the Meiji era.
Omi merchants practiced this beneficial plan for three parties and considered it their secret to their long success.