January 31st, 2014, marked the new lunar year in China – the year of the horse. All workers got 10 
days off, to go home or visit somewhere exotic to celebrate the Chinese New Year or the Spring Festival. It was estimated that for this year’s Spring Festival, there were over 3.6 billion “journeys” made by Chinese people via plane, train, bus, and even by donkey. This mass exodus is officially known as “the world’s largest human migration”. By comparison, in the United States, a mere 93.3 million people traveled domestically during the 2012 holiday season.
Over the past 15 years, I have not taken any trips in China during this period of time, so I can’t tell you how crazy busy it must be. What I can tell you is that it has always been crazy to go anywhere during the Chinese New Year break. I still vividly remember in 1996 when I took an overnight train from Hang Zhou to Fu Zhou right before the Chinese New Year. I was literally confined to my seat for 16 hours without a break to the bathroom because I simply couldn’t move. Every inch around me was filled to capacity with people. And that was 18 years ago. I can’t even imagine what it must be like today.
So how can technology help?
First, imagine if the national train ticketing system got an upgrade of an advanced analytics software with the built-in predictive analysis capability that connects in “real-time” with customer requests. It could provide insights, well ahead of the travel date, on which routes (e.g. between Beijing and Guang Zhou) will be in extremely high demand . The central transportation committee can then take this data and add additional trains on those routes, allowing more people to go home and celebrate the new year with their loved ones.
Second, imagine a similar business intelligence technology being used by the municipal governments or the commercial help agencies in Beijing and Shanghai. During the ten day holiday break, almost every resident living in Beijing, Shanghai or other big cities feels some pain without the migrant workers supporting their needs. Their live-in nannies, the breakfast vendor at the corner of their street, the go to hairdressers, probably all have gone home. To keep the city afloat, local government and help agencies usually play a guessing game on the type of temporary help needed and recruit accordingly. Imagine if there was a “live” dash-board that could show all the areas in high demand, and perform a “real-time” resource matching service.
And last but not the least, billions of Renminbi (Chinese Dollars) are spent during the Spring Festival. Business intelligence and predictive technology could help maximize revenue and profit for all major resellers.
As you can see, technology can really improve the biggest human migration on earth during Chinese New Year celebration. So as we enter the year of the horse, can you guess which business intelligence technology is being used to help travelers get to their destinations more efficiently? Please comment below.
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