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just as the entire internet industry is in a period of major adjustment, meituan, which is part of it, is not immune.

adjustments will also accompany meituan’s development in 2022.

such a state is not only reflected in meituan’s daily development process, but also reflected in meituan’s financial reports.

from the perspective of revenue and profit, meituan has delivered a relatively satisfactory answer.

revenue increased by 22.8% and profits turned around, which is undoubtedly a pretty good achievement and is a direct reflection of such a satisfactory answer.

however, from a specific business perspective, meituan is still on the road of exploration.

whether it is its reliance on traditional food delivery business or its continued money-burning model in new business exploration, almost all of them have allowed us to see some hidden worries in the development process of meituan.

when the "retail" + "technology" strategy enters its second year, how to take such a development strategy in-depth, especially how to find the right way and method for meituan to get rid of its reliance on the traditional food delivery business and realize the platform the transformation of the economy into a digital economy may be an important issue that meituan must solve.

the takeaway ceiling is getting closer

it has to be said that through meituan’s 2022 financial report, we can see very intuitively that food delivery is still responsible for the beauty of meituan’s financial report.

it can be said that meituan’s position as the leader in the food delivery field is almost unshakable.

however, what we also have to see is that if meituan’s development goals and direction are only focused on food delivery, and if meituan is simply defined as a food delivery platform, then such a development model will not be possible no matter what. none of them can bring more room for imagination to meituan.

the reason is that food delivery is actually very dependent on traffic.

however, the reality is that the bonus period for traffic is no longer there, and more and more players who take traffic as their ultimate goal and pursuit are increasingly encountering development bottlenecks.

how to break the dependence on traffic and find new development breakthroughs has become an important issue that almost all traffic players must face.

the same is true for meituan.

although meituan has now established a strong user mentality and formed a relatively deep and wide moat.

however, if meituan’s development is only tied to traffic, if meituan’s development is limited to the acquisition and harvesting of traffic, then when meituan’s traffic ceiling gets closer and closer, we will still see meituan will face similar traffic difficulties as other internet players.

how to get rid of dependence on traffic, how to shift the focus of meituan's development away from traffic, and find newer development models other than traffic may be the key to opening up new imagination space for meituan.

in the second year since the "retail + technology" strategy was proposed, how to implement such a strategy and find new breakthroughs in vertical development may be a more critical issue facing meituan.

the “money shredder” of new business is still sounding

as a new unicorn that developed in the mobile internet era, meituan's development still has not escaped the vicious circle of scale and efficiency, and it still has not jumped out of the cyclical law of the development of internet players.

therefore, what we see is that in order to obtain new development and achieve new breakthroughs, meituan has continuously begun to deploy community group buying, taxi hailing, shared bicycles and many other businesses that were not originally its own.

after all, meituan still wants to find new development breakthroughs and profit growth points through expansion on such a scale.

it has to be said that for every internet player, they have the advantage of such scale and efficiency to continue to achieve new development.

the same is true for meituan.

however, what we also need to see is that one of the most direct results of such a development model dominated by scale and efficiency is that it will continue to concentrate resources and advantages on certain top platforms. in hand, it will trap users into a handful of systems.

therefore, what we see is that the relevant departments have corrected such a development model that is dominated by scale and efficiency. whether it is the suspension of community group buying or the correction of data maturity, it is almost a direct reflection of such a development state.

what needs to be made clear is that when the development model of scale and efficiency is restricted so that it cannot quickly build scale advantages, the development model that has been tried and tested in the past will face problems of one kind or another.

the same is true for meituan.

indeed, by replicating its original successful experience in the field of food delivery in the field of taxi-hailing and community group buying, meituan can indeed reduce the cost of trial and error and continue to maintain its original scale advantage.

however, if such a development model is restricted, especially when its input and output cannot be equal, then the so-called exploration of new businesses will also become a "money shredder."

how to balance the relationship between new business and old business, especially how to make meituan's new business break out of the old business development model, may be an important issue that meituan must solve.

what is certain is that if meituan still continues its past development model, if meituan still continues its past practices, then new businesses will not only fail to bring imagination to meituan, but will even become a "drag" that hinders meituan's development. bottle".

the platform positioning has not fundamentally changed

i have to say that we have indeed seen many changes in meituan in the past year.

whether it is applying new elements represented by drones and intelligent robots to the daily delivery process, or exploring new businesses such as instant retail business and in-store services, or even meituan’s in-depth empowerment of merchants, it can almost be seen that meituan is trying to get rid of its determination to position itself as a platform.

however, although meituan has made so many explorations and attempts, these explorations and attempts have indeed changed the appearance of meituan to some extent.

however, what we also need to see is that essentially, meituan’s nature as a platform has not changed much.

in a sense, these new explorations carried out by meituan are basically maintaining its own platform model.

obviously, this is neither in line with meituan’s “retail + technology” strategy nor in line with the general development trend of the platform economy.

in my opinion, the original intention of meituan’s “retail + technology” strategy is actually to change meituan’s approach of being just a platform, but to define itself more as an infrastructure company and one that is deeply involved in the industry. a company, not just a platform company in a simple sense, if it only uses new technology to strengthen such a new strategy, then meituan will not be able to get rid of its past development difficulties in any case.

from the perspective of the development environment of the entire internet industry, we can also see that meituan’s development model is not in line with the general development trend of the entire industry.

for the current internet industry, the integration of data and reality is a trend and trend.

for every internet player, what they really need to do is to find the correct way and method to integrate themselves with the real economy, especially to find a way to integrate the digital economy derived from the internet with the real economy. if they cannot find such a way if we just blindly continue the past development model, we will not be able to achieve long-term development.

through meituan’s financial report, we can still see its extreme reliance on its own platform positioning and its stagnation in exploring new development models.

it is conceivable that if meituan still continues such a positioning, and if it only defines itself as a platform and center, then its development will not only deviate from the "technology + retail" strategy, but also deviate from the development of the entire internet industry. major trends.

conclusion

it may be more appropriate to describe meituan's 2022 financial report as "mixed blessings and sorrows."

fortunately, meituan’s position in the food delivery field is unshakable and is constantly being optimized.

what is worrying is that meituan still has not found the correct way and method to break out of the previous development model, and is still hesitating and wandering in the previous development cycle.

for meituan, this year is the second year that the “retail + technology” strategy has been proposed.

it must be said that the original intention of the "technology + retail" strategy is to let meituan bid farewell to its past development model and constantly find new development breakthroughs.

however, judging from the reality, meituan seems to be using such a strategy to continuously strengthen its previous development model, without really finding ways and means to break out of the previous development model.

if meituan does not make adjustments, especially if it does not truly understand and implement the "retail + technology" strategy, then when the traffic ceiling gets closer and closer, when the platform model comes to an end, and when the dividends of digital-real integration are exhausted, meituan may miss an era that truly allows its development to enter a new cycle, just like the era that achieved its success in the past.