2014 年，Uber 雄心满满地进入中国市场。然而很快他们就发现了一个让人绝望的现实：任何创新，滴滴都能在两周内抄到位。 卡兰尼克说：“我们拼尽全力做出一个功能，完成时觉得简直太牛了。结果上线两周后，嘭——他们做出来了。再过一周，嘭——他们又把另一个做出来了。”这根本算不上竞争，而是单方面的压制。 更讽刺的是，为了应对这场无限制战争，Uber 在硅谷总部专门划出一整层楼，招募了 400 名华人员工，组建“中国增长团队”。他们甚至在加州 101 号高速旁打出中文广告：“加入 Uber，服务祖国。” 这就是极端竞争的样子：你的对手复制速度快到让你不得不全力以赴才能勉强领先。但最终，即使全力以赴，也挡不住对方的创新速度。 后来，滴滴开始做出自己的创新，Uber 已经追不上了。 从模仿到创新，中国公司完成了转型。 卡兰尼克说，当一个组织把“复制”做到极致，不断加速，最终就会转向创造与创新——因为已经没有东西可以抄了。 如今，如果你想理解外卖行业的未来，你不该看纽约——你应该看上海。许多 Uber Eats 或 DoorDash 最近推出的新功能，其实在中国三四年前甚至更早就已经出现了。 举例而言，北京和上海等大城市的写字楼附近普遍有智能取餐柜：外卖员把餐放进取餐柜，由楼内专职跑腿人员再送到各楼层。 In 2014, Uber entered the Chinese market brimming with confidence. They soon discovered a despairing reality: any innovation could be copied by Didi within two weeks. “We worked our asses off to build a feature, and when it was done we thought it was unbelievably awesome,” Kalanick said. “Then two weeks after launch, boom, they had it. A week later, boom, they had another one.” This wasn’t competition; it was a one-sided beatdown. Even more ironically, to cope with this unlimited war, Uber set aside an entire floor at its Silicon Valley headquarters, recruiting 400 Chinese employees to form a dedicated China growth team. They even put up Chinese-language ads along California’s Highway 101: “Join Uber, serve the motherland.” That’s what hyper-intense competition looks like, your rival copies so fast you have to go all-out just to stay ahead. But in the end, even going all-out couldn’t hold off the opponent’s innovation. Later on, Didi developed innovations of its own, innovations Uber couldn’t catch up to. From copying to innovating, Chinese companies completed that transformation. Kalanick said that when an entity pushes copying to the extreme, moving faster and faster, it will eventually pivot to creation and innovation—because there’s nothing left to copy. Today, if you want to understand the future of online food delivery, you shouldn’t look to New York, you should look to Shanghai. Many new features launched on Uber Eats or DoorDash actually appeared in China three or four years ago, or even earlier. For example, office buildings in major cities like Beijing and Shanghai often have smart lockers nearby; couriers drop meals into the lockers, and dedicated runners inside the building deliver the food upstairs.