Source: Zhejiang Youth Online - Youth Times, Author: Zhou Chunchun "We were among the first batch of enterprises to resume work on February 10. By March, production capacity and sales had recovered to 80%. Now we have fully resumed operations, and as of April, sales have grown 31% year-on-year. We are currently preparing four e-commerce platforms." On the evening of April 17, Wahaha Group Chairman Zong Qinghou talked with CCTV Finance host Chen Weihong, introducing Wahaha's current resumption of work and production, and announced that the company would enter e-commerce by building four platforms: a health products e-commerce platform, a food and beverage e-commerce platform, a cross-border e-commerce platform, and Habao Amusement Park. Business registration data shows that on March 24, Hangzhou Wahaha E-commerce Co., Ltd. was established with a registered capital of 200 million yuan, with Zong Qinghou as legal representative. The company's business scope includes food sales, food internet sales, import and export of goods, and import/export agency. On April 2, Hangzhou Wahaha Hongzhen Cross-border E-commerce Co., Ltd. was established with a registered capital of 5 million yuan, also with Zong Qinghou as legal representative. Its business scope includes internet sales, daily necessities sales, and import/export of goods. -01- Zong Qinghou: I am not against e-commerce; I am against burning money and selling counterfeit goods In previous years, Zong Qinghou made some remarks about e-commerce that led the public to label him as "against e-commerce." Now he says he will do e-commerce himself, which has surprised many. In response, Zong Qinghou frankly stated during the April 17 program: "I was not keen on them (e-commerce) before because I was dissatisfied with burning money to buy traffic and selling counterfeit and shoddy products. I am not against e-commerce. Moreover, I believe e-commerce should go deep into rural areas to help farmers sell products, because farmers are relatively isolated from information and may increase production without increasing income." After reviewing Zong Qinghou's public remarks in recent years, reporters found that he has never been against e-commerce; what he opposes are behaviors that disrupt market order, such as burning money to buy traffic, selling counterfeit products, and not paying taxes. (2016, "Finance Big Shots Answer") At the same time, Zong Qinghou has repeatedly emphasized that "the real economy is not against the internet" and that "the internet is a double-edged sword." If used well, it can improve the management and technical level of the real economy; if not, it can impact the real economy. (In August 2019, CCTV "Dialogue," Zong Qinghou shared the stage with Alibaba's Zhang Yong and NetEase's Ding Lei) In the "Cai Yue Ni" program in early 2020, Zong Qinghou directly pointed out that online and offline channels are interdependent and should be combined. Many internet companies are developing offline, and Wahaha is also developing online. He specifically cited an example: "If you do e-commerce in rural areas and sell rural products to cities, I think you are doing a great thing for the country and the people." (Early 2020, Tencent News "Cai Yue Ni") It can be seen that Zong Qinghou is not blindly resistant to or rejecting e-commerce as rumored. In fact, he has always maintained an open and rational attitude toward e-commerce. On one hand, he fully recognizes the value of e-commerce in creating employment, promoting product circulation, and supporting the real economy; on the other hand, he firmly opposes unreasonable behaviors such as burning money, selling fakes, and not paying taxes. When the e-commerce industry gradually becomes standardized and mature, and aligns with Wahaha's development direction, he is very willing to "embrace" it. -02- Advancing the "Big Health" Strategy, Building a Vertical Health Products E-commerce Platform When asked why Wahaha wants to do health products e-commerce, Zong Qinghou said that China's big health industry has reached a trillion-yuan market size and is very promising. Moreover, the pandemic has made consumers more concerned about their health, driving the development of the big health industry. Wahaha proposed the "Big Health" strategy many years ago and has strong strength in the R&D and production of healthy foods. Furthermore, there is currently no professional vertical health products sales platform in China, which is also an opportunity for Wahaha. In addition to selling its own products, Wahaha plans to invite well-known domestic and foreign health product brands to join, meeting consumer needs. Public information shows that Wahaha established a food research institute long ago, with CNAS-accredited laboratories, post-doctoral research stations, and other platforms. In recent years, Wahaha has actively implemented the "Big Health" strategy, establishing a modern bioengineering research institute to conduct research on strains, traditional Chinese medicine food therapy, health foods, natural products, and enzyme preparations through bioengineering and modern extraction technologies, committed to providing consumers with more high-tech, high-value-added health products. (Wahaha strain workshop) -03- Exploring "Smart Manufacturing" to Support "Big Health" During the program, Zong Qinghou also visited the production workshop to explain the production process and flow of Wahaha's big health products. He mentioned that Wahaha has established an electromechanical research institute and a precision machinery company, dedicated to research on intelligent beverage production lines and intelligent equipment industrialization. To support the implementation of the "Big Health" strategy, Wahaha's Electromechanical Research Institute cooperates with the Food Research Institute to independently plan and design first-class domestic intelligent strain production workshops, intelligent tablet production workshops, supercritical extraction soft capsule production workshops, high-capacity intelligent solid beverage production workshops, and intelligent plant extraction workshops, among other modern production facilities. Zong Qinghou said that intelligent production not only improves production efficiency and reduces costs but also ensures quality stability during production, maximizing product safety. In the future, Wahaha will focus on its main business, use industrial digitalization as a means, develop high-end automation equipment and integrated applications of industrial robots for the entire industry, and play a demonstrative and leading role in the transformation of traditional food and beverage manufacturing toward intelligence. (Wahaha's independently developed palletizing robot) -04- Promoting Online-Offline Integration, Building a Digital Marketing Platform Zong Qinghou also mentioned that consumers have now developed online shopping habits, and due to the pandemic, a large amount of consumption has shifted from offline to online, while Wahaha's channel advantage has always been offline. Based on these insights, Wahaha plans to establish its own food and beverage e-commerce platform to promote the combination of online and offline channels and build a digital marketing platform. Once the platform matures, it can also help other companies sell food and beverages. Compared with other platforms, Wahaha's channel advantages are very prominent. Over 33 years, Wahaha has carefully woven a joint sales network covering nearly 10,000 distributors, hundreds of thousands of wholesalers, and millions of sales terminals, reaching counties, towns, and villages across the country like capillaries, enabling Wahaha's new products to be distributed nationwide in the shortest time. After the e-commerce platform is built, all distributors, wholesalers, and terminal stores will be included in the network. Every offline store can become an e-commerce warehouse or transfer station, and every in-store salesperson can be a delivery person. After consumers place orders, the backend can quickly match the nearest warehouse to the delivery address, delivering products to consumers at the fastest speed and lowest cost. Speaking of Wahaha's future, Zong Qinghou expressed great confidence. He plans to recruit more young people in the group this year. After the e-commerce platform is built, he also wants to recruit 100,000 entrepreneurs to become retailers, solving their employment problems and helping them realize their entrepreneurial dreams. He said: "Our company is internally demanding excellence and striving to be a century-old brand. We have been starting our business for 33 years, and consumers are growing up generation by generation. We must adapt to the needs of each generation and develop products that suit each generation to survive in the long run." In recent years, Wahaha has been seeking self-innovation and breakthroughs. On the basis of deepening its main business, it has promoted brand upgrades, increased efforts in big health, and explored smart manufacturing. This is also a microcosm of the transformation and upgrading efforts of many traditional physical manufacturing enterprises. If Wahaha's e-commerce transformation succeeds, it will bring hope and confidence to more traditional enterprises, stimulating deeper potential and vitality in the Chinese market. And that is exactly the situation we most want to see. Tips will be paid 400-2000 yuan once adopted.