北京——几乎每年6月，在公司成立的周年纪念日上，刘强东都会戴上一顶大大的摩托车头盔，穿上红色的制服，跳上一辆三轮电动车，为他的电子商务公司京东送货。
这是京东董事局主席兼首席执行官、41岁的亿万富翁刘强东的公共宣传活动的部分内容。但是，通过这种方式，人们也能更好地了解京东在技术和物流方面所面临的挑战。目前，京东正在仅次于美国的世界第二大经济体中，激烈地争夺电商霸主的地位。
长期笼罩在对手阿里巴巴阴影下的京东，也通过刻画自己的独特身份，成为了中国的另一个网络巨头。
阿里巴巴的市场提供了一个连接买家和卖家的平台，京东则从制造商和分销商手中购买商品，把存货放在自己的仓库里，这种模式与亚马逊(Amazon)类似。然后，它会安排快速送货服务，其配送的商品包罗万象，既有电视机、冰箱，也有袜子和T恤，送货的摩托车在中国大型城市的车流中进进出出。
与亚马逊一样，京东也在基础设施方面投入了巨资，斥资逾15亿美元（约合94亿元人民币）在中国各地修建和租赁仓库与配送中心。但是，京东采取了更进一步的举措，甚至还在用自己的货车和20000余名快递员提供送货到家的服务。这一切都是为了夺取中国的电商市场。到2020年，中国电商市场预计将达1万亿美元。
已在美国上市的京东目前是中国最大的直销零售商，去年拥有4600万活跃用户和大约200亿美元收益。
“这种商业模式并不适用于每个人，但他们去建立起这个模式是很明智的，”投资银行里昂证券(CLSA)驻香港的网络分析师梁向奕(Elinor Leung)说。“现在，他们的流量正在飞速增长。”
然而，这种打造在线零售商的方式成本高昂，让一些分析人士颇为担心。这些人表示，京东可能会被它的有形资产和日益增加的债务拖累。几名分析人士说，公司在2017年前无法盈利。阿里巴巴董事局主席马云等竞争者都不认同京东的商业模式，称之存在可悲的缺陷。
“不是我比他强，”马云在近期发表的一次采访中说。“而是方向性的问题。所以，我在公司一再告诉大家，千万不要去碰京东。别到时候自己死了赖上我们。”他后来对自己的言论表示了道歉。
京东总部设在北京，其高管坚持认为，他们正在建设的公司，最终将在电商行业获得压倒性优势，拥有强大的客户服务，快速的运输，并且能保证它运送的货物是真品，而非仿冒品。他们称，目前面临着许多重大挑战，其中之一就是应对数量巨大的网络订单。过去三年中的每一年，网络订单的数量都翻了一番。
“只要我们想，马上可以实现盈利，”公司最大部门京东商城的首席执行官沈皓瑜说。“但是我们的近期目标是扩大客户群。”
京东是其创始人远大抱负的产物。刘强东是一个货运船主的儿子，在中国东部省份江苏省最贫穷的地区长大，后来在位于北京的中国人民大学修读社会学。
大学期间，他利用业余时间写软件代码，用挣来的钱在学校附近开了一家小餐厅。他说，由于餐厅员工盗用了一大笔钱，餐厅最终倒闭。
大学毕业后，刘强东在创业前曾在一家日企工作。他在北京的高科技区中关村的电子产品市场租了一个摊位卖软件、电子产品和光盘刻录机。几年之内，他就在三座城市拥有了实体电子商店。
2004年，当他的商店开始在网上销售商品时，由当当、卓越和阿里巴巴的淘宝网所领导的中国网络购物刚刚开始成形。当时英文名还叫做360Buy.com的京东，凭借低廉的价格和快速的送货获得了蓬勃发展，这两点在今天是京东的格言。
2006年，由于资金不足，刘强东准备从一家香港风险投资公司获取200万美元（约合1250万元人民币）的资金。但这家投资公司——今日资本——提供了1000万美元，以获取少数股份。尽管该公司出售了一些股票，其股份价值现在仍接近24亿美元。
这些资金帮助京东扩展了产品供应，在电子设备以外还提供其他产品，研发新的系统和软件。产品供应的扩展帮助京东吸引了更大的投资商，比如老虎环球(Tiger Global)、俄罗斯亿万富翁尤里·米尔纳(Yuri Milner)、沙特阿拉伯王子瓦利德·本·塔拉勒(Alwaleed bin Talal)，以及沃尔玛超市(Wal-Mart Stores)背后的沃尔顿家族(Waltons)。
今日资本合伙人、总裁徐新说，“我一次见到他时，我知道他很聪明、可靠，他有一种好胜心。”
投资商相信刘强东对提供全面服务的网络零售商的展望。
当时，中国的快递服务非常糟糕。中国建造了新公路和新大桥，但卡车运输却因为糟糕的服务，收费公路及其他瓶颈而受阻。中国没有类似联邦快递(FedEx)和UPS的快递服务公司，包裹经常不能及时到达，而且还被压得变形。
“当时，在我们收到的投诉中，70%是关于快递，每一个环节都很慢，”刘强东在公司总部接受采访时说。“我们意识到物流与用户体验有关。”
因此从2007年开始，京东做了其他中国电子商务公司当时或以后都不愿做的事情。京东从零开始，建造综合物流网络，承诺为顾客提供从下单到送货的服务。
如今，京东拥有七个物流中心，在39个城市建立了118个仓库，还在大约500个城市设立了1045个自提点。自2010年以来，京东承诺大多数在晚上11点前提交的网络订单都将在第二天下午3点前送到。
摩根士丹利(Morgan Stanley)称京东的商业模式是亚马逊和UPS的结合体；还有一些分析人士表示，该公司现在看起来有点像沃尔玛，致力于物流和基础设施，同时又有网站作支撑。
京东“已经表明，他们不仅仅是零售商，还会是网络供应链、金融公司”，上海华东师范大学电子商务教师陆建平说。“做零售没有利润，但能产生交易量和现金流。未来，主要的利润来自金融及供应链业务。”
京东开辟了自己的道路，寻求为中国快速增加的消费阶层提供便利的网络购物服务，承诺提供可靠商品，准时送货，只收取少量运费或免费，并提供发票。在这个逃税行为猖獗的国家，很难获得发票。
如今，公司网站流量爆增，每天发送的订单超过200多万份。在这个世界上，没有哪家直销零售商的收益增长速度赶得上京东，包括亚马逊。
美国网络初创公司在中国举步维艰。亚马逊于2004年大举进入中国市场，当时该公司耗资7500万美元收购了卓越网——当时中国最大的电子商务初创公司。艾瑞咨询集团(iResearch Consulting Group)提供的数据显示，10年之后，亚马逊中国的业务在网络购物市场中所占的份额不到2%。
阿里巴巴在美国的名气比京东大，但京东最大股东刘强东正受到热烈欢迎。去年早些时候，刘强东带领公司在纳斯达克挂牌上市，筹集到17.8亿美元。
刘强东在同一时间还与中国社交媒体、移动游戏巨头腾讯达成协议，让京东可以利用腾讯巨大的用户群。腾讯现在持有京东20%的股份。
刘强东还将带领京东涉足网购生鲜及金融方面的业务，像阿里巴巴一样为商家提供贷款。但与阿里巴巴、亚马逊不同，刘强东称他对开设电影或娱乐部门没有多大兴趣。
“我们不想制作电影或电视节目，但愿意涉足金融领域，”在回到有关基础设施的谈话前，刘强东说。“我们每隔几年就会投资建设新仓库。我们需要一些温控仓库。”（中国进出口网）
BEIJING — Just about every June, on the anniversary of his company’s founding, Richard Liu dons a big motorcycle helmet and red uniform, hops on a three-wheeled electric bike and makes home deliveries for his e-commerce company JD.com.
It is in part a publicity stunt for Mr. Liu, the 41-year-old billionaire who is the company’s chairman and chief executive. But it is also a way to better understand the technical and logistical challenges facing JD, which is in a pitched battle for e-commerce supremacy in the world’s second-biggest economy after the United States.
Long overshadowed by its rival Alibaba, JD has emerged as China’s other online goliath by carving out its own distinct identity.
While Alibaba’s marketplace serves as a platform to connect buyers and sellers, JD buys goods from manufacturers and distributors and holds the inventory in its own warehouses, in a model that echoes Amazon’s. It then arranges for quick delivery of virtually everything from television sets and refrigerators to socks and T-shirts, using motorbikes that weave in and out of traffic in some of the country’s biggest cities.
Like Amazon, JD has invested heavily in infrastructure, pumping more than $1.5 billion into building and leasing warehouses and order-fulfillment centers around China. But JD has gone even further, venturing into home delivery with its own fleet of trucks and more than 20,000 couriers, all in the hope of capturing what is projected to be a $1 trillion Chinese e-commerce market by 2020.
JD, which is publicly traded in the United States, is now China’s biggest direct-sales retailer, with 46 million active users and an estimated $20 billion in revenue last year.
“This isn’t a business model for everyone, but they were smart to build it,” said Elinor Leung, a Hong Kong-based Internet analyst at CLSA, an investment bank. “Now, their traffic is exploding.”
And yet this costly approach to building an online retailer has worried some analysts, who say that JD could be weighed down by its physical assets and mounting debt. Several analysts say the company won’t turn a profit before 2017. Competitors like Jack Ma, chairman of Alibaba, have even disparaged the company’s business model, calling it tragically flawed.
“It’s not that we are better,” Mr. Ma said in a recently published interview. “It’s an issue of direction. So, I tell my people: Definitely do not get involved with JD.com. Don’t come blaming us if you die one day.” He later apologized for his comments.
Executives at JD, which is based in Beijing, insist they are building a company that will eventually have a commanding advantage in e-commerce, with strong customer service, speedy delivery and assurances that the products it ships are authentic, not counterfeit. Among the biggest challenges now, they say, is keeping up with an enormous volume of online orders, which have doubled in each of the last three years.
“If we wanted, we could be profitable right now,” said Shen Haoyu, chief executive of JD Mall, the company’s biggest division. “But our immediate goal is to grow our customer base.”
JD is a product of its founder’s ambitions. The son of a cargo shipowner, Mr. Liu grew up in one of the poorest parts of east China’s Jiangsu Province, before arriving in Beijing to study sociology at Renmin University.
During his spare time in college, he wrote software code and earned enough money to buy a small restaurant near campus. He says the restaurant failed after staff members embezzled large sums of money.
After college, Mr. Liu, whose Chinese name is Liu Qiangdong, worked briefly for a Japanese company before going into business for himself. He rented space at an electronics market in the city’s high-tech zone, called Zhongguancun, to sell software and electronics, including compact disc burners. Within a few years, he owned brick-and-mortar electronics shops in three cities.
In 2004, when his stores began selling goods on the web, online shopping was just beginning to take shape in China, led by start-ups like Dangdang, Joyo and Alibaba’s Taobao site. JD, whose English name at the time was 360Buy.com, thrived on low prices and fast delivery, part of its motto today.
With money running low in 2006, Mr. Liu sought $2 million from a Hong Kong venture capital firm. The firm, Capital Today, put up $10 million instead, for a large minority stake. The stake is now worth close to $2.4 billion, even after the firm sold some of its shares.
The capital injection helped JD expand its product offering beyond electronics and develop new systems and software. The expansion, in turn, helped lure bigger investors, such as Tiger Global, the Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia and the Waltons, the family behind Walmart Stores.
“The first time I met him, I knew he was smart and trustworthy, and that he had a killer instinct,” said Kathy Xu, the partner who led the Capital Today investment.
Investors bought into Mr. Liu’s vision for a full-service online retailer.
At the time, China’s package delivery services were terrible. The country had new roads and bridges, but truck shipments were hampered by poor service, toll roads and other bottlenecks. With no Chinese equivalent of FedEx or UPS, packages often arrived late, in dented boxes.
“Back then, 70 percent of our complaints were about deliveries, and everything was very slow,” Mr. Liu said during an interview at the company’s headquarters. “We realized logistics is related to user experience.”
So beginning in 2007, JD did something no other Chinese e-commerce company was willing to do then or since. It started building an integrated logistics network from scratch, promising to cater to customers from click to dro-off.
Today, the company boasts seven fulfillment centers and 118 warehouses in 39 cities. There are also 1,045 smaller pickup centers in about 500 cities. And since 2010, the company has pledged that most online orders placed before 11 at night will be delivered by 3 p.m. the next day.
Morgan Stanley calls JD’s business model a combination of Amazon and UPS; other analysts say the company is beginning to look like Walmart, steeped in logistics and infrastructure and backed by a website.
JD “has made it clear they will not only be a retailer but also an online supply chain and finance company," said Lu Jianping, who teaches e-commerce at East China Normal University in Shanghai. “Retail is not profitable but it offers trading volume and cash flow. In the future, the main profits will come from finance and the supply chain."
By following its own path, JD has sought to make online shopping easier for China’s growing consumer class, promising authentic goods, delivered on time, for little or no delivery fee — and with a receipt, something hard to come by in a country wher tax evasion is rampant.
Today, traffic to its website is exploding and the company is filling more than two million orders a day. No other direct sales retailer in the world has seen its revenue grow as quickly as JD, not even Amazon.
American Internet start-ups have struggled in China. Amazon made its big foray into China in 2004, when it paid $75 million to acquire Joyo.com, then one of China’s biggest e-commerce start-ups. A decade later, Amazon’s China operation has less than 2 percent of the online shopping market, according to iResearch Consulting.
And though Alibaba is better known in the United States, Mr. Liu, JD’s biggest shareholder, is finding a warm reception. He led the company’s public stock offering on the Nasdaq early last year, which raised $1.78 billion.
Around the same time, he also struck a deal with China’s social media and mobile gaming giant Tencent, which allows JD to tap into Tencent’s huge user base. Tencent now owns about 20 percent of JD.
Mr. Liu is also pushing JD into online groceries and finance, and lending to his vendors the way Alibaba does. But unlike Alibaba and Amazon, he says he has little interest in developing film or entertainment divisions.
“We don’t want to produce films or TV shows, but finance, yes,” Mr. Liu said, before returning to his thoughts on infrastructure. “And every few years we’ll invest in new warehouses. We need some temperature-controlled warehouses.”
