Review of Pinduoduo: Origin and Consumer Orientation

Professor Wang Defeng's video on "Dependent Origination and Emptiness" is always deeply moving and enlightening every time I watch it.

Colin Huang once mentioned in his book "Uncertain Love—Buddhism, Quantum Mechanics, Logic, and AI" that Buddhism teaches everything is empty and one should not cling to anything. Today, I'd like to apply the framework of "Dependent Origination and Emptiness" to discuss Pinduoduo.

If my insights are shallow, I apologize in advance. Before diving into the main content, I recommend everyone watch this video.

1. Dependent Origination: Seeing the "Convergence of Conditions"

"Dependent Origination" means that all things in the world are not isolated but arise from the convergence of various conditions (causes and conditions). Pinduoduo's rise was not due to Colin Huang inventing something new but rather his keen observation of the massive, overlooked convergence of conditions in the market at that time.

Before Pinduoduo's rise, the "conditions" in the consumer market were fragmented:

1. Supply-side conditions: As the world's factory, China had an extremely oversupplied production capacity, with an endless stream of white-label goods. However, this capacity was squeezed out by Taobao/JD.com's "consumption upgrade" strategy.

2. Demand-side conditions: Hundreds of millions of users in third- and fourth-tier cities and rural areas had just started using smartphones and WeChat, grabbing red envelopes and binding bank cards. They had the desire to consume but were ignored by mainstream e-commerce platforms.

Mainstream attention was fixated on the single "reality" of the middle class, believing that consumption must be upgraded (buying more expensive brands). Pinduoduo saw the fluidity of "Dependent Origination": once the abandoned production capacity (cause) and the ignored population (condition) combined, they would generate enormous energy.

Pinduoduo merely acted as a connector, allowing these pre-existing conditions to naturally undergo a chemical reaction.

2. Emptiness: Breaking the Obsession with "Brand" and "Premium"

"Emptiness" does not mean nothingness but refers to the absence of a fixed, unchanging essence (self-nature) in things. Pinduoduo's profundity lies in its extreme proximity to the state of "breaking self-attachment" in business.

1. Breaking the "view of self-nature" in products (demystification)

Traditional business narratives attempt to 赋予 products "additional meaning," such as brand stories, emotional premiums, and status symbols. From a Buddhist perspective, this is "superimposition"—illusory additions to the true nature of things.

Pinduoduo's logic is to return to the essence, focusing on value itself:

A pack of tissues is for wiping hands, not for flaunting status. Fruit is for eating, not for fancy gift boxes.

Through ultra-low prices, Pinduoduo pulls products down from the "brand altar" and restores them to their true nature as "objects." It tells consumers: you don't need to pay for the logo; you only need to pay for functionality.

This is a business perspective of "emptiness": products have no inherent nature; only their utility is real.

2. Breaking the platform's "self-attachment" (no-self)

Most platforms, after growing large, develop "self-attachment," maintaining the platform's tone and the interests of big merchants, which is essentially protecting their own interests.

For a long time, Pinduoduo exhibited a "ruthless" consumer orientation, even to the point of "platform no-self," such as:

1. Refund-only: This is a highly controversial strategy. It assumes merchants may act maliciously and unconditionally favors consumers. This shatters the traditional illusion of "fair trade" and forcibly tilts the power balance toward the weaker consumers.

2. Algorithm prioritizes products over stores: On Taobao, you focus on "stores." On Pinduoduo, you see "individual products." Pinduoduo prevents merchants from forming "private traffic" (preventing merchants from forming a "self"), forcing them to compete for consumers at the lowest price at every moment.

3. Consumer Orientation: Aligning with Human Nature, Consumption Equality

Implementing "Dependent Origination and Emptiness" at the execution level means extreme consumer orientation.

1. Aligning with the reality of "greed, hatred, and delusion"

Many apps are designed based on what users "want to be" (highly educated, disciplined), while Pinduoduo is designed based on what users "actually are."

a. "Cut one more"/gamification: Exploits human greed (seeking bargains) and delusion (addiction to feedback). Pinduoduo does not judge the morality of these desires but aligns with them. It acknowledges: most people are price-sensitive and crave instant gratification.

b. Inclusive equality: The so-called "people inside the Fifth Ring Road" mock Pinduoduo as "low," which is itself a form of arrogance (self-conceit). Through low prices, Pinduoduo enables low-income groups to enjoy material abundance. In Pinduoduo's algorithm, the priority of fulfilling the needs of a rural aunt buying ¥9.9 slippers is equal to that of an urban white-collar worker buying an iPhone.

2. Redefining value (detachment from form)

In Pinduoduo's logic, cheap is not "low-end"; cheap is the ultimate manifestation of "efficiency." Through C2M, Pinduoduo eliminates all middlemen. This is like "dispelling delusions" in Buddhism—cutting out intermediaries, advertising fees, and channel costs, allowing producers to face consumers directly.

This "directly pointing to the mind, seeing nature and becoming Buddha" approach to the supply chain ultimately results in ultra-low prices.

4. Conclusion: Profound Realism

Pinduoduo's rise, explained through "Dependent Origination and Emptiness," is:

1. It saw "Dependent Origination": It seized the historical conditions of China's oversupplied supply chain and most people's pursuit of affordability.

2. It practiced "Emptiness": It stripped away the illusory brand premiums on products, returning value to its utility.

3. It achieved the extreme of "consumer orientation": It 放下 the platform's 架子， even at the cost of 骂名， to align with the true 人性 (desire for bargains, pursuit of 实惠) of the broadest consumer base.

$PDD(PDD.US) $BABA-W(09988.HK) $JD-SW(09618.HK)