[ToB] Overview of Industrial Internet

Industrial Internet is different from consumer Internet. Based on the new generation technologies such as big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence, it uses Internet thinking to effectively open up the production process, establish interconnection between the supply side and the demand side, and realize rapid response and collaboration in production. At present, industrial internet has a certain industrial and environmental foundation, but compared with developed countries such as the United States, China's enterprise service industry is underdeveloped, and industrial internet still has a lot of room for development.

Industrial Internet is an inevitable process brought by the exhaustion of traffic dividends, and it is also a way for the Internet industry to shift from attention economy to value economy. The production process is complicated and the chain is long. Industrial Internet can give birth to a large number of node service enterprises and generate new opportunity value. Industrial Internet is by no means a simple "technology+"building block concept innovation, but the embodiment of technology in industrial applications. Its fundamental significance lies in breaking and reshaping the industrial form and organizational model.

Industrial Internet is combined with seven major industries, such as finance, manufacturing, logistics, retail, entertainment, education and medical care, showing completely different application characteristics. Because of its dual attributes of capital flow and information flow, finance can become the starting point for other industries to establish connections; As traditional pillar industries, manufacturing and logistics are of great significance for industrial upgrading and cost optimization. Driven by the consumer Internet, the retail industry is infiltrating upstream to form a more effective circulation chain. The entertainment, education and medical industries are also undergoing industrial Internet transformation, but the core links of the industry are highly non-standardized, and the upstream and downstream value signals of the industry are still difficult to get through.

IResearch believes that the industrial upgrading brought by the industrial Internet is a process in which industry service providers export the original competitive barriers to products. For industry practitioners, it is necessary to start from their own advantages, form the comprehensive capabilities of IT, industry and Internet, and export services as products.

Overview of Industrial Internet: Returning to the Connection Essence of Network

Industrial internet concept

Rebuild all links of traditional industries and build a new cooperative network.

Industrial Internet is a process in which Internet connections penetrate from the consumer side to the industrial side. On the basis of the new generation technologies such as big data, cloud computing and artificial intelligence infiltrating all links of the traditional industrial chain and reshaping, we will effectively open up the production process, establish the interconnection between the supply side and the demand side, and realize the rapid response and coordination of production.

Industrial Internet broke through the traditional linear information transmission and passive resource scheduling mode of industrial participants, broke the information barrier among industrial participants, built a new supply relationship, and finally developed into a distributed and decentralized thinking. Under the influence of industrial internet, resources and information among industry participants interact and respond rapidly, which will eventually reorganize industrial networks and form a value ecology.

Industrial internet VS consumer internet

The integration of industrial Internet and consumer Internet returns to the essence of connection.

Ai Rui believes that industrial Internet and consumer Internet are not two separate and independent concepts. On the contrary, the industrial Internet has completed and reconstructed the connection chain between the production end and the consumption end on the basis of the consumer Internet. Finally, through the integration of connections, production signals, demand signals and price signals can be effectively transmitted, and funds and goods can flow most efficiently.

Characteristics of Industrial Internet: Fracture and Reconstruction of Value Logic

Passive transformation under the disappearance of traffic dividend

Industrial Internet drives Internet services from "staking" to "intensive cultivation"

Although the emergence and development of industrial internet is inevitable after the maturity of technology and business form, the disappearance of C-side traffic dividend has played an important role in promoting the rapid development of industrial internet.

Industrial Internet is a reasonable path for Internet giants to penetrate upwards.

In the era of consumer Internet, Internet giants such as Ali and Meituan have established brand-new industry infrastructure with consumers as the entrance, technology as the support and platform as the carrier. On this basis, Internet technology giants can penetrate upward along the industry supply chain, complete the empowerment integration of the supply side, and realize business collaboration and production chain extension. Compared with other industries, industries with such "super integrators" have closer links between production and consumption, and the integration of industrial Internet and consumer Internet is faster. The upgrading and transformation of the production end has also brought huge ecological effects to these integrators.

Decentralized reconstruction to create new value of industrial chain

Industrial Internet promotes the decentralization of industrial chain and reconstructs new centers.

Consumer Internet is based on traffic and attention economy, with short production chain, simple relationship between supply and demand, and almost zero marginal cost of service, thus forming the overall pattern of Internet oligopoly. However, the industrial participants in the production field are more diverse and the industrial chain is long and complex. Industrial Internet will form a multi-node production network with a series of links, such as upstream resources, middlemen, service enterprises, core production enterprises and end consumers, which is a process of information flow decentralization. Ai Rui believes that the complexity, diversity and professionalism of the production network make it difficult to have a global oligopoly in the field of industrial Internet. At the same time, the establishment of production network will form a number of interconnected key nodes and give birth to new node-type value centers.

At the turning point of the industrial era, the industrial Internet has changed the mode of large-scale industrialized production.

Since the era of industrial revolution, the refined division of labor and mass production based on assembly line have spread to almost all industries, forming a supply-side driven supply-demand model of production-inventory-marketing-consumption. The characteristics of mass production, such as long cycle, high inventory and lack of individuality, are increasingly difficult to meet the current rapidly changing and diversified economic needs. Industrial Internet has brought new changes to the production and consumption patterns formed since the industrial revolution. Through the two-way connection between the supply side and the demand side, a rapid feedback mechanism with high interaction between demand and supply is formed, and the integration and innovation of the whole industrial chain are promoted.

Give the industrial chain the ability to digitally transform and reshape links.

Conceptual innovation is no longer a selling point, but the fundamental purpose is to reorganize the upstream and downstream core links.

Although the development of industrial Internet depends on core technologies such as big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence and Internet of Things. It is accelerating the commercialization of technology development and seeking more practical application scenarios where technology can be put into practice, but the industrial Internet is by no means a simple "technology+"building block concept innovation. Its fundamental significance lies in changing industrial forms and organizational models, optimizing enterprise production, management and financing models, strengthening industrial synergy and interaction, and realizing optimal allocation and optimization of resources.

Specifically, R&D, design, manufacturing, content creation, sales, collaborative management and other core links in the production process can all become the targets of industrial Internet transformation through technology infiltration. New technical scenes, platforms, management concepts and other elements also need to be integrated into the new network relationship shaped by the industrial Internet to achieve landing applications.

Image of industrial form after the development of technology integration

Find diversified application scenarios and organization methods for emerging technologies.

In recent years, in this round of intelligent revolution, the industrialization trend of new technologies is obvious, and all kinds of emerging technologies accelerate their integration while developing iteratively, which promotes the continuous increase of the scale of software and information service industry. Among them, the Internet of Things/sensor technology can effectively connect the physical world and the digital world. Mobile computing and mobile Internet technology make smart terminals become the peripheral nerves of industrial Internet. Cloud computing endows the industrial Internet with sufficient computing power support and resource sharing mechanism. Big data can store, analyze and visually utilize the massive data generated during the operation of industrial Internet. Artificial intelligence helps to establish expert system, human-computer interaction and business decision-making process. 5G improves communication transmission efficiency and accelerates the fission of new production organization mode. The traceability trust mechanism built by blockchain can guarantee the security of industrial Internet ... The good inclusiveness of industrial Internet can provide experimental soil for scene application and fusion testing of various technologies to test the industrial application significance and commercialization effect of technologies.

Technology integration to a specific stage can promote the diversification of industrial Internet forms.

With the gradual deepening of the intelligent revolution, emerging technologies are accelerating their integration while iterating their own development, promoting the development of the real economy and business innovation. IResearch believes that the main goal of the industrial Internet is to achieve interconnection and cross-border reshaping. After the technology carriers such as big data, artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing, Internet of Things/sensors, and 5G are fully integrated, with the help of the integrated platform of industrial Internet, the penetration iteration process of various traditional industries will be accelerated. While testing the feasibility of the scene and verifying the commercial value, it also develops the development characteristics of industrial Internet forms such as interconnection, diffusion and external stimulation. In the future, all participants in the industrial internet will continue to join various emerging technologies, and the morphological characteristics of the industrial internet will be more diversified, thus giving birth to more business imagination.

Industrial Internet Application: Path Reconstruction of Value Signal

Finance: the dual cut-in of finance and information circulation

Finance is a better entrance to the industrial Internet service system.

Capital has natural information attribute, and financial intermediary needs to be realized through the transfer of industrial value. Ai Rui believes that the relationship between modern financial services and the production, transmission and use of information is increasingly close, the degree of "financialization" of economic activities is deepening, and financial resources and information are increasingly becoming essential elements of production activities. Under the background of industrial internet, there is a natural connection between the efficient flow of funds and the rapid connection of information. For industries and fields where digital and information services are difficult to enter, financial tools may be more effective than information platforms to connect with the industrial Internet.

Financial service providers have certain advantages in expanding SaaS services upwards.

For traditional industries that lack data and information, it is difficult for industrial internet to connect through information, and financial service providers themselves have advantages in the industrial chain and are powerful promoters of such industries. Financial service providers can extend the packaging service of data+technology+funds through "payment first". Ai Rui believes that the nature of financial institutions in the industrial Internet may change, and the content of financial services will be more abundant. Financial service providers can become the comprehensive service role of SaaS service providers, and may also form the overall ecology of SaaS service providers.

Manufacturing: continuous integration of production delivery and in-depth service

Production collaboration network makes production as a service possible.

"Manufacturing as a service" is a product that manufacturers use the production infrastructure network. In the form of implementation, the prototype of MaaS is that producers can enjoy manufacturing equipment (financial leasing) and manufacturing capacity (OEM), and consumers can instantly make products through 3D printing technology (* * enjoy 3D printing) to reduce costs and realize flexible and rapid production. With the improvement of organizational capacity and flexibility of production network, Europe and the United States and other countries have gradually formed a professional MaaS platform to provide real-time production services for aperiodic flexible orders.

Mas: In the field of industrial manufacturing, highly dispersed discrete manufacturing is given priority.

Industrial manufacturing can be divided into process manufacturing and discrete manufacturing according to production mode, and discrete manufacturing can be divided into heavy discrete manufacturing and light discrete manufacturing according to production scale and discrete degree. At present, MaaS service providers, such as commercial gangs and cloud factories, mainly serve light and discrete manufacturing industries. However, in the heavy discrete manufacturing and process manufacturing industries, due to the concentration of production capacity, small fluctuations in demand and difficulties in separating production processes, industrial interconnection still stays in the information interconnection stage represented by the industrial Internet, and there is no mature MaaS service provider. Ai Rui believes that due to these industrial characteristics, the development of MaaS in industrial manufacturing needs to combine information flow with production factors such as capital and equipment to form a production cooperation network centered on production factors (rather than pure information).

Logistics: a new generation of service providers accelerate multi-link running-in

Create a digital supply chain ecosystem and realize the ideal state of "flywheel effect"

Traditional logistics mainly exists as a supporting system, pursuing economies of scale and achieving the best experience, efficiency and cost at some logistics nodes. With the rapid decline of the Internet of Things 5G technology and sensor costs, the Internet of Things is gradually popularized in the end-to-end supply chain usage scenarios, realizing the interconnection of people, equipment, vehicles and goods in logistics scenarios. And then achieve the ideal state of "flywheel effect" of the industry as a whole.

The high reconstruction cost is the main bottleneck of the slow progress of instant data connection.

The fierce competition among logistics enterprises and users' high sensitivity to logistics costs require logistics enterprises to carry out refined cost management from the perspective of reducing costs and increasing efficiency, so as to improve market competitiveness and sustainable development ability. At present, the logistics industry has a large freight stock, involving many links and complicated processes. The overall improvement of the industry supply chain requires conditions such as vehicle-goods matching, process visualization and supply scheduling, which are not necessary for most demanders. At the same time, it involves the large-scale increase of fixed costs and variable costs, which greatly erodes short-term profits, which is the main reason that affects the process of industrial interconnection in logistics industry. Ai Rui believes that the limitation of transformation cost means that the ecological realization of industrial Internet in the logistics industry must be gradual, and its driving force comes from the continuous improvement of enterprise competition barriers and the continuous reduction of technology costs.

Retail: Rebirth Driven by Consumer Internet

Industrial internet breaks the circulation relationship of traditional retail supply chain

According to iResearch, the next stage of retail industry in internet plus will focus on the intermediary circulation and the reconstruction of B2B relationship network. Traditional retail supply chain is in a linear state, participants exchange information in turn, and the signals of value and supply and demand are transmitted through multi-level distributor network, which has low transmission efficiency and poor return path of demand information. The data network and supply chain infrastructure brought by the consumer Internet may re-establish the direct connection between scattered retailers and suppliers, forming a simple and efficient connection path.

Entertainment: The process of value chain integration is far from complete.

Content platform enables consumers to become producers at the same time and participate in the process of value superposition.

In the entertainment industry, the diversification of users' access to content and the explosive growth of entertainment platforms such as short videos and live broadcasts have made consumers more and more involved in the process of content production. Ordinary users can not only make videos directly through various tools and become the direct creators of content, but also influence the connotation and creative trend of works through interaction, barrage, voting and secondary creation. As producers, consumers participate in the production of entertainment content, creating a decentralized value return path, making many "amateurs" become popular entertainment content producers and responding to market demand more quickly, accurately and flexibly.

Education: The demand side is very complex and can be easily cut into parts.

Information management system is the entry point of internet in education industry.

There are many types of downstream end users in the education industry, and the personalized demand is complex, so it is difficult to reach the whole industrial chain digitally. The most likely success of the internetization of education industry is to start from the management link and realize the platform management of software and service providers. At present, the education industry is still extremely decentralized, and educational institutions are parallel and independent, resulting in inefficient allocation of high-quality resources. By building an industrial Internet platform focusing on educational services, the relationship between supply and demand in the industry can be reorganized more scientifically and the cost structure of the industry can be improved.

Medical care: industrial internetization is still "struggling"

Only government forces can substantially promote the internetization of the medical industry.

Medical care is one of the most important livelihood issues. Due to the strong public service nature of China's medical system, the industry development is strongly influenced by the government and social security institutions, the medical resources are in short supply for a long time, the willingness of medical institutions (hospitals) to connect is not strong, the upstream suppliers (pharmaceutical companies) and demanders (doctors and patients) play a weak role in the industry, and the driving force for the development of industrial Internet is insufficient. Since the start of the new round of medical reform, with the promotion of the government, the supply of medical resources has continued to increase, and the way of seeking medical treatment has been improved day by day. However, there are deep data barriers among medical institutions, government departments and service enterprises, and the development of industrial Internet for health care still faces many challenges. The medical industry is still "struggling" with the Internet.

Industrial Internet Action: Product Export of Competitive Barriers

Opportunity space and suggestions for action

Industry differentiation and business segmentation bring infinite space for industrial Internet services.

Although the application progress of industrial internet in various industries is different at present, the penetration degree is generally insufficient. However, in the production network of industrial Internet, the intersection of different sub-sectors and different business links can create a huge number of service nodes. These nodes will further realize cooperation and division of labor and form a new cooperation network. Therefore, iResearch believes that the industrial Internet continues to promote industry differentiation and business segmentation, and the opportunity space for service providers is almost unlimited. The end point of industrial internet will never be an oligopoly unified market, but a diversified cross-innovation market with extremely active participants.

Source: iResearch