Peers Inc

Chinese title: 共享经济 - Rebuilding the Future Business Model

English title: Peers Inc: How People and Platforms Are Inventing the Collaborative Economy and Reinventing Capitalism

Publication Year: 2015-9-25

ISBN: 9787213067853

Notes:

Taking Zipcar, the company she founded, as her entry point, and by analyzing the well-known sharing companies of the day, Uber and Airbnb, the author gives a detailed and in-depth reading of the sharing-economy model. The key to the sharing economy lies in: excess capacity, participation by everyone, and a sharing platform.

Peer sharing gives an individual the capabilities of a company and lets that person focus on the areas where they are strongest. Ideas, research, design, style, naming, brand slogans, pricing and sales volume — an individual can often take part in several of these, and mutual cooperation between people completes the whole chain. Everyone can become an entrepreneur or a micro-entrepreneur, especially in today’s economic environment, if the barriers can be lowered and people are given the incentive to go into business.

The best solutions do not come from experts and scholars in the field. In fact, the less related the problem to be solved is to their expertise, the more likely they are to come up with a winning solution. Posting a bounty to solicit opinions often yields unexpectedly good results, whether it is a solution, a scientific problem, or the development of an app.

The narrower the field’s scope, the greater the possibility of making the company big.

The advantage of the peer-sharing structure comes in large part from the diversity of participation. Diversity lets peer-sharing companies take part in customization, localization and specialization at lower cost.