8th November 2025 – (Wuzhen) Liu Qiangdong, the Chinese entrepreneur and former chief executive of JD.com, returned to the World Internet Conference Wuzhen Summit for the first time in eight years, outlining an aggressive push into autonomous logistics and forecasting profound shifts in work and leisure.
Speaking at the 2025 gathering, Liu said JD’s automation has reached a level where robots now handle about 90% of tasks at the company’s Beijing sorting centre. He announced plans to launch what he described as the world’s first fully unmanned delivery station in April next year, with drones taking off and landing on the facility’s roof and robotic arms loading parcels inside, completing end-to-end handling without human intervention.
Liu argued that advances in unmanned warehousing and intelligent distribution are now mature, predicting a near-term future in which courier logistics no longer requires human labour. Within five years, he said, authorised delivery robots could securely open doors and place packages inside customers’ homes.
Positioning technology as an enabler rather than a replacement for people, Liu contended that automation will free society from heavy manual work and spur fresh demand in areas such as cultural creativity, historical exploration and art-themed travel. He went so far as to project a tenfold expansion of the global tourism market over the next five years.
Returning to the conference after last attending in 2017, the JD.com founder framed the coming decade as one of radical change to working patterns, suggesting humans may eventually need to work only a day—or even an hour—a week as intelligent systems take on routine tasks.