Neolithic secured nearly 400 million yuan, but the one quietly counting the money is the "small-town dealmaker".

Now that unmanned logistics has become a definite business, how can ordinary people make money from it?

20 years ago, the first batch of outlet owners who secured county-level franchise rights seized the first wave of era dividends from the rise of China's e-commerce simply by buying a few second-hand vans and hiring several couriers.

That was the golden decade of explosive growth in labor force and service outlets, when ordinary people caught the era dividend and grew wildly.

20 years later, this industry is undergoing a strikingly similar yet completely subversive mirrored transformation. The end outlets still exist and the distribution demand remains huge, but the vans and drivers back then are being replaced by small unmanned vehicles shuttling through the streets.

Not long ago, Neolithic completed its nearly 400 million US dollars Series E financing. In the current primary market, this amount is eye-catching enough. Many people's first reaction is that the autonomous driving track is seeing another major boom.

However, I have noticed a very interesting change: in this round of financing statement, Neolithic mentions less and less that it is a "vehicle manufacturing company", but repeatedly emphasizes "transport capacity network".

As I understand it, what this means behind the scenes is that this company has shifted from simply selling equipment to selling transport capacity services.

This sends a very clear commercial signal: the end-point unmanned distribution business has been technically and cost-wise verified and feasible. Just like the rise of e-commerce back then forced the popularization of express outlets, the second wave of dividend period for the reconstruction of end-point unmanned transport capacity has arrived.

Then for ordinary people, the topic most closely related to their own interests is how to make money from this definite business?

The first group of people to make money are "town-level operators"

There is an obvious fact: No matter how much financing Neolithic raises, it cannot handle the localized heavy operation of the last kilometer in thousands of counties and industrial parks across the country.

This is exactly where the "town-level operators" come into play.

In the past, many people who wanted to enter this track still stuck to the thinking of joining as an agent. They thought that buying two unmanned vehicles from the manufacturer, parking them in the warehouse waiting for customers to come, or just hanging a sign as an agent could make easy money.

This kind of gameplay does not work at all in the unmanned distribution track.

The so-called "town-level operator" is essentially a heavy operator of the local logistics business. They hold the real orders of local SF Express, Yuantong/Yunda/ZTO/STO express outlets or fresh food supermarkets on one hand, and dispatch the unmanned vehicles on the other hand, earning the operation margin by improving fulfillment efficiency.

Take the real project implemented by Neolithic in Lanshan County, Yongzhou, Hunan as an example. Locally, the unmanned distribution vehicles have built an end-to-end logistics chain covering more than ten towns and over 200 administrative villages.

On these county and rural routes, it is the familiar local operators that actually support the operation of the vehicles. They charge the outlets for transport capacity service fees by order or by month, and earn the margin from order fulfillment.

Their daily work is very down-to-earth: confirm the cargo volume with the dispatchers of each town's outlets in the morning, and set the driving routes for the unmanned vehicles; regularly check the dust on the sensors; once encountering complex road conditions such as steep slope illegal parking or rural road intersections, they ride electric scooters to the scene quickly to help the vehicles get out of trouble.

For manufacturers, such local people are indispensable connectors. It is impossible for manufacturers to send engineers from Beijing or Hangzhou to stay at the intersections of small towns every day to clean the mud on the vehicle sensors, let alone handle the tobacco, alcohol and bills at the dinner tables of outlet owners.

Only people who hold local orders, have rapid ground service response capabilities, and are familiar with the local road right environment can make this set of hardware truly operate smoothly.

How exactly do you calculate the accounts of this business?

The reason why unmanned distribution can become a definite business is ultimately that people can make their own books add up in this chain.

When you break down this set of accounts, it is actually very clear.

The first layer is the customer's account, that is, why express outlets or supermarkets are willing to pay for the service.

According to the publicly available accounting logic of the logistics industry, the cost per unit of the fixed short-haul connection from "outlet to service station" is about 0.8 to 1 yuan. In the past, it was necessary to hire full-time drivers to drive vans, and the cost remained high due to labor, fuel and depreciation; the most troublesome part was the night shift, as there was simply no driver willing to work from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.

After using unmanned vehicles to run the night shift connection, the idle night time is activated, and the goods to be delivered the next morning are transported to the service stations in advance. For outlet owners, the transportation cost per order can be directly reduced by more than 0.1 yuan, with an overall cost reduction range of over 10% to 20% (even reaching 30% on some high-cost routes). Cost reduction can be directly converted into profits, so outlet owners are naturally willing to pay for transport capacity services.

The second layer is the operator's account, that is, how local heavy operators make money through the fulfillment margin.

Operators charge outlets for transport capacity service fees, settled by order or on a monthly lump sum basis. The monthly transport capacity revenue generated by each vehicle is relatively fixed. After deducting the vehicle lease fee paid to the manufacturer, the daily charging and battery swapping cost, and the operation and maintenance cost of their own ground service rescue, the rest is pure operation surplus.

There is a very practical logic here: a good account for a single vehicle does not mean a good account for the whole fleet. If there is only 1 vehicle, the operation and maintenance labor cost cannot be amortized; but when the fleet size in a certain area reaches 5 to 10 vehicles and forms route density, the marginal operation and maintenance cost will be quickly reduced, and the operating cash flow will flow in steadily.

The third layer is the service provider's account, that is, how supporting personnel with venues and relevant skills earn stable service fees.

As the number of unmanned vehicles in an area increases, people who provide supporting services can also get a share of the dividends. For example, some property management companies with idle venues on the edge of communities, or local auto repair shops, do not need to buy vehicles. They can make their own small business profitable just by building automated charging and battery swapping piles in the venues, doing routine chassis inspection and LiDAR calibration for unmanned vehicles, and earning high-frequency service fees.

Four profit-making models under the definite trend

When the infrastructure is paved by OEMs, ordinary people who want to find opportunities in this definite track do not need to follow the trend blindly. The key is to see what chips they have in their hands.

Combined with several regions with rapid implementation in the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta, there are mainly four entry paths:

The first type: Transport capacity operator (suitable for people who have outlet, urban distribution or fixed route resources).

This is the most core position, which is the town-level operator we mentioned earlier. They form a local small fleet by leasing or lease-to-own, and directly sell transport capacity lump-sum services to express outlets or supermarkets. They earn the margin brought by the reduction of fulfillment cost through high-frequency operation and route density.

The second type: Transport capacity matchmaker (suitable for people who have local merchant and outlet resources).

They enter the market with an asset-light model. They do not run their own fleet, but are familiar with the distribution needs of local e-commerce, fresh food or outlets, assist transport capacity platforms such as Neolithic to land orders locally, and get long-term channel commission and per-order commission.

The third type: Venue and energy replenishment service provider (suitable for people who have idle venues in communities and industrial parks).

They revitalize the idle edge venue resources in their hands, build unmanned vehicle docking points and charging facilities, and charge fixed parking fees and electricity price margin from the fleets running on the routes.

The fourth type: Ground operation and maintenance team (suitable for people who have auto repair skills or a network of local technicians).

They transform into a "ground service clinic" in the unmanned vehicle era. They undertake offline rescue, trouble-shooting, sensor cleaning and calibration, and daily maintenance with 30-minute response, and charge ground service fees to the operators according to service frequency.

In fact, if you look back at the implementation process of new technologies in recent years, almost every industry will go through the same development course:

Companies that develop technologies raise large amounts of capital in the capital market and tell grand narratives; it is those local people who understand the trend and the accounts, and are willing to do the dirty and tiring work, that truly make the technology take root.

The nearly 400 million US dollars financing obtained by Neolithic has pushed the unmanned distribution infrastructure across a threshold. What will inevitably happen in the coming period is that technological dividends will gradually give way to local operation dividends.

There are various ways to lose money, but profit always follows the same script.

In this unmanned logistics revolution, the most tangible profit opportunities will always belong to those "town-level operators" who hold real orders, are familiar with local streets and lanes, and are willing to handle every unexpected situation at every intersection.

This article is from the WeChat Official Account "Yangtze River Delta Momo", author: Sanhuo, published with authorization from 36Kr.