Internet bosses have retired one after another.

After Ali Ma Yun, Pingduo Huang Zheng and byte beat Zhang Yiming announced their retirement from the "second line", JD.com and Liu Qiangdong also recently announced that they would step down as CEO.

In the context of repeated epidemics and more uncertainties in the international environment and regulatory policies, it is intriguing for Liu Qiangdong to step down at this time.

Industry insiders point out thatThe collective alternation of those in charge of enterprises at the head of the Internet symbolizes the end of one era and the beginning of another.

At present, a large number of domestic Internet giants are taking the initiative to shrink the front. The industry believes that the traditional rough development model which depends on flow and capital dividend has been difficult to sustain, and today's Internet companies urgently need to take a high-quality technology-based development route.

Liu Qiangdong leaves office

On the morning of April 7, JD.com Group announced that Xu Lei, president of JD.com Group, will replace Liu Qiangdong as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of JD.com Group. At the same time, Xu Lei will join the board of directors of JD.com Group as an executive director. Liu Qiangdong will continue to serve as chairman of the board of directors, committed to the company's long-term strategic design, major strategic decision-making and deployment, young leading personnel training and rural revitalization.

However, after leaving the post of CEO, JD.com 's overall development plan and enterprise positioning are still under the control of Liu Qiangdong.

Earlier, equity data disclosed by JD.com showed that Liu Qiangdong held 434.5 million shares of JD.com, accounting for 13.9 per cent, but accounted for 76.9 per cent of the total voting rights. Of these, 13.5% is held through Max Smart Limited, with 72.9% of the voting rights. Tencent holds 16.9 per cent of the shares through Yellow River Investment Co., Ltd., with 4.6 per cent of the voting rights, while Walmart Inc holds 9.3 per cent with 2.5 per cent of the voting rights.

On February 3, 2022, JD.com announced that Chairman Liu Qiangdong would donate 62.3766 million Class B common shares to a third-party foundation for charitable purposes and had submitted relevant documents to the Securities and Exchange Commission. According to different voting structure, JD.com 's share capital includes Class An ordinary shares and Class B ordinary shares. Holders of Class An ordinary shares may cast 1 vote per share, while holders of Class B ordinary shares may cast 20 votes per share.

After the donation, Liu Qiangdong's stake has been reduced to 360 million shares, which is still higher than that of Walmart Inc, while the voting right still dominates.

Xu Lei took over as JD.com CEO.

Xu Lei has joined JD.com Group for more than 10 years. According to JD.com 's Q3 financial report in 2019, under the leadership of Xu Lei, JD.com 's retail operating profit margin increased to 3.3%, the highest since listing.

In addition, Xu Lei led the construction of JD.com 's marketing and public relations system, as well as the platform operation system, and led the design of JD.com 618 marketing activities. At present, 618 has become one of the landmark events in China's economy every year.

In Xu Lei's more than ten years in JD.com, JD.com 's revenue has been close to one trillion yuan. JD.com Group previously released its financial results for 2021, showing that its net income last year reached 951.6 billion yuan, an increase of 27.6 percent over the same period last year, and the number of annual active users reached 570 million. However, last year, JD.com Group turned a profit into a loss, and the net loss attributed to common shareholders in the current period was 3.56 billion yuan.

Anxin Securities said that under the weak situation of overall domestic consumption, JD.com still maintained the vitality of income and user growth, and showed the resilience of its performance. at the same time, the implementation of the market sinking strategy and the scale effect of JD.com 's retail and logistics make the medium-term growth prospects clearer.

According to China Business report, before joining JD.com, Xu Lei was in charge of Lenovo Group Limited brand and product network promotion at Lenovo, and later held a number of senior management positions in marketing and operation in Haoye Advertising Network and Belle e-commerce.

In 2009, Xu Lei joined JD.com and held a number of leading positions in the sales and marketing department of JD.com Retail, including head of Marketing and Brand, head of JD.com Wireless Business Department and head of platform Operations.

In April 2017, Xu Lei became CMO of JD.com Group, reporting to Liu Qiangdong. JD.com Mall announced the implementation of rotation CEO system on July 16, 2018. Xu Lei, CMO of JD.com Group, served as the first rotation CEO of JD.com Mall.

"Maverick" is the label of Xu Lei, who was rumored to have asked only one question when interviewing returned students from the UK, "which team do you like in the Premier League?" "

Xu Lei really received wide attention at the annual meeting of JD.com Mall in 2019. JD.com Mall held its annual meeting on January 19, 2019. JD.com Mall's rotating CEO Xu Lei became the keynote speaker, and the keynote speaker in the past annual meeting was usually Liu Qiangdong. Xu Lei said at the annual meeting that JD.com Mall's business philosophy is "trust-based, customer-centered value creation." After the annual meeting, it was speculated that Xu Lei was trained as a second-in-command. Xu Lei then responded on Weibo Corp that there were too many associations.

On Xu Lei's report card, when he was the first CEO of JD.com retail, Xu Lei established the business philosophy of "trust-based and customer-centered value creation", led the retail business to achieve high-quality growth for several years in a row, and launched the supply chain mid-Taiwan construction and omni-channel strategy, accelerating the cultivation of JD.com 's new growth curve. In addition, Xu Lei's leadership set up JD.com 's marketing and public relations system, as well as the platform operation system, which promoted JD.com 's strategic transformation to mobile. He also led the design of JD.com 618 marketing campaign and took the lead in opening up JD.com 's supply chain capabilities to the outside world. Xu Lei is also a director of Dada Nexus Limited and AiHuiShou International Group.

Since 2019, Xu Lei has become more and more prominent in JD.com 's activities. Liu Qiangdong, the founder of the group, did not attend either JD.com 's listing in Hong Kong or the listing of JD Health and JD Logistics, Inc.. At the bell-ringing ceremony of JD.com 's listing in Hong Kong, Xu Lei, then the CEO of JD.com Retail, stood in the main position.

In addition, Xu Lei also became the main spokesman on the earnings call after 2019.

Why do Internet bosses retire one after another?

Since 2021, a number of Internet giant founders have announced their commitment to a longer-term career.

In March 2021, Huang Zheng, founder of Pinduoduo, stepped down as chairman of Pinduoduo and was replaced by co-founder and CEO Chen Lei.

In May and November 2021, Byte Jump founder Zhang Yiming stepped down as Byte Jump CEO and Chairman of the Board, respectively, and was replaced by co-founder Liang Rubo.

Further back, in 2013, Jack Ma resigned as CEO of BABA Group. Six years later, at the celebration of BABA's 20th anniversary, on his 55th birthday, Ma Yun officially announced his retirement and stepped down as chairman of the board of directors of BABA Group.

Securities Times analysis pointed out that the "retirement" of Internet bosses is more like the transformation of the founders. Internet competition is becoming increasingly fierce, and the competition among enterprises has changed from "tactical" competition to "strategic" competition. At the same time, for Internet enterprises, reducing the impact of individuals is actually conducive to improving the organizational structure of the company, ensuring that enterprises achieve long-term development, and maintain vitality and innovation.

What will be the share price of Internet companies in the future?

Since February 2021, the share prices of Internet giants have generally undergone a major adjustment due to a number of internal and external factors. What will be the future trend of stock prices?

Wu Renhao, a partner in Gao Yi assets and a senior fund manager, said in a recent foreign exchange that looking to the future, the policy side will have less impact on the Internet industry than in 2021. On the other hand, most Internet companies have fallen by more than 70% since 2021Neither simply pessimistic that the industry has no driving force for growth after tighter regulation, nor blindly optimistic that the industry will inevitably usher in a sustained systematic and comprehensive rise after the slump.

The agency said it would more objectively identify companies that have laid the basic framework for social infrastructure but have not yet reached the ceiling of growth. Against a backdrop of limited overall Internet penetration, companies that can adapt to the new regulatory framework and return to performance growth will be able to assess how much room for upward market capitalization is. What we are looking forward to is the continued growth brought about by the recovery of performance growth.

The Shanghai Securities News recently quoted "running for private affairs"Dong ChengfeiAccording to the point of view, there are both positive and negative factors for Internet companies.

In his opinion,Although the worst of the policy is over, the Internet dividend period is over, and this industry will change from a growth industry to a mature industry. Many businesses are restricted and restricted, and the overall development potential is not as good as it used to be.The positive factor is thatAt present, this sector is already in the bottom area, and the head Internet company has a stable market position and stable cash flow.The return in the future will also be good, investors should not hold the previous idea, appropriately reduce the expected rate of return, and consider it for a long time.

It is worth noting that although the heads of a number of Internet companies have announced "retirement", most people are actually retreating and advancing.

Huang Zheng, founder of Pinduoduo, said in March 2021 that after resigning as chairman, he would devote himself to basic research in the fields of food science and life science.

In May 2021, Byte Jump founder Zhang Yiming issued an internal letter announcing his resignation as CEO. In this internal letter, Zhang Yiming decided to put aside the day-to-day management of the company, focus on long-term important issues such as long-term strategy, corporate culture and social responsibility, and plan to "relatively focus on learning knowledge, systematic thinking, research on new things, hands-on trial and experience." for a period of ten years, create more possibilities for the company.

Before that, Liu Qiangdong not only personally led the preparation of JD.com Capital, but also joined his wife Zhang Zetian in investing in funds under Sequoia Capital China, Qiji Chuangtan, pickup Jade Capital, Banyan Capital, and so on, which seemed to be laying out a larger game of chess.