Lu Benfu: Mobile phones are the "end of history"? Ren Zhengfei was already thinking about the next step

【Editor/Observer Network Bai Ziwen】

On November 11-12, 2020, the 6th China and Globalization Forum hosted by the Globalization Think Tank (CCG) was held in Beijing. Lv Benfu, vice president of the National Innovation and Development Strategy Research Association, delivered a speech at the round table looking forward to the future decade of the digital economy.

Courtesy of Lv Benfu, Vice President of the National Innovation and Development Strategy Research Association, Globalization Think Tank (CCG).

The following is the full text of Lü Benfu's speech, which was compiled and published by the Observer Network:

Bill Gates has said that forecasting information technology in two years is always too short, ten years is always too long, so we have to predict the decade of the digital economy is indeed too long to say that there is 100% certainty. I've been working on the digital economy for almost 20 years, and the next 4 directions should be certain.

First, work-life rebalancing. After the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, there are two phenomena, one is that the use of Zoom in the United States and Tencent in China has grown very rapidly. The reason is that people can work from home and rebalance work and life. There is a word called WFM in English, that is, working from home and not going to work, which can be expected.

How to rearrange work and life? For example, in schools like mine, although classes can now be online and off, half of our classes are online, because although the epidemic in China has passed, it can save transportation costs. This work model should become the most common and normal model in the next 10 years, but there is a question of proportion, how large the proportion is, and sometimes it still needs to be communicated on the spot, so there is a rebalancing of work and life.

Second, the problem of information terminals is still deepening. Why China has become a worldwide digital economy power, the greatest contribution is the number of mobile phones, China's mobile phone ownership is 1 billion, each Internet netizen averages 1.2, some people have two. The presence of mobile phones and apps lowers the barrier to entry to the Internet. Now we have a word called "sinking market", now the old men and women in the countryside play fast hand, vibrato is better than the average student play, called fast shaking market. Without the existence of mobile phones, it is impossible to complete the popularization of this digital economy.

In the next ten years, will it still be the world of mobile phones? Mobile phones have replaced PCs, are they still the most important information terminals? not necessarily. For example, I went to Huawei some time ago to meet Mr. Ren Zhengfei, and he said that now Huawei is sanctioned because of mobile phone chips, they are developing information glasses and preparing to develop into a $10 billion industry. You wear glasses to get online, probably faster than your phone. In the family, such as small degree speakers, small love speakers, gradually become the new love of the elderly over 60 years old, this glasses and speakers may replace mobile phones, become the primary Internet tool, so this pattern will change. Let's not think of the phone as if it were a permanent one, not necessarily. Indeed, the existence of mobile phones has brought about drastic changes in China's information revolution and sharing economy. For example, our current mobile payment, without the existence of mobile phones, mobile payment will not be so popular. But the information terminal revolution is not complete. Whether it is glasses, speakers, or even refrigerators, buying milk can be purchased according to the smart consumption at home and the promotion of manufacturers, smart refrigerators may account for 15% of orders, and the revolution of information terminals is still continuing.

Third, intelligence, artificial intelligence, etc. Mining various laws on the basis of big data should be one of the most important main themes in the next 10 years, with two distributions: one called unmanned economy, unmanned, unmanned aircraft, unmanned waiters, and some unmanned factories, which reflects that artificial intelligence has replaced a certain type of labor. There is an ethical question, such as who is responsible for the accident of a driverless car? Is it the manufacturer's, the driver's, the passenger's? Wait, we're looking at this ethical question. If the driverless car is an old lady on the left and a child on the right, if you have to hit a person, who will you hit? This is called the meta-problem of artificial intelligence, the most basic problem. For example, is artificial intelligence allowed to overtake? Is it allowed to take the emergency lane? If the passenger shouts three times in a row, he is responsible for paying the bill. There are a lot of ethical issues here that will be encountered in the next decade.

There is also a digital twin called intelligence. Now there is a saying, artificial intelligence sometimes knows more about yourself than yourself, in addition to having a body active in physical space, artificial intelligence can understand your preferences, in the virtual space there is a reflection of you, called the digital twin, in the next ten years, the digital twin on your behalf to do shopping, do a variety of more trivial things, this will exist. Digital twin technology is still developing rapidly, so intelligence will certainly be the main theme of the next decade.

Fourth, digital currencies. Of course, this digital currency and Bitcoin are not the same thing, some are not endorsed by the state, digital currencies like Bitcoin, and some are fiat digital currencies made by the state. Just talked about the rebalancing of life and work, information terminals, and intelligence, all of which are things about productivity, and digital currency changes production relations. If everyone's consumption traces and consumption records have digital currency records, it may change a lot of things. For example, if all civil servants' salaries in the future are paid in digital currency, will they dare to embezzle? Is this one of the greatest productive relations?

In short, the productive forces and the relations of production will undergo revolutionary changes in the next decade. There may not be so much to expect in two years, but there can be great expectations for the next decade.

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