On April 22, the hashtag #JD外卖崩了 JD Takeaway Crashed trended on Weibo, racking up 73.3 million views. Many users reported that merchants on JD Takeaway weren’t accepting orders, suggesting a possible system crash. At 1:21 p.m. that day, JD.com’s official Weibo account responded, saying a surge in orders during the lunch rush caused a temporary system failure, which had since been resolved. As an apology, JD announced that all deliveries delayed by over 20 minutes would be free, and users who placed orders during the outage would also receive a ¥10 no-strings-attached coupon.
This marked JD Takeaway’s second crash within a week, following a similar issue on April 16. At the time, JD explained that its popular “Hundred-Billion Subsidy” campaign had pushed platform traffic to four times the usual level, causing a short disruption. As an apology, JD issued 100,000 “Spend ¥15, Save ¥10” coupons.
JD.com has been drawing plenty of buzz on social media. On April 21, a user posted a photo with JD founder Liu Qiangdong wearing a JD Takeaway uniform and holding a takeout bag. The hashtag #刘强东亲自送外卖 Liu Qiangdong Delivers Takeaway quickly trended. The user captioned the post: “Just got my first delivery from Brother Dong himself—what an honor! Guess I can say I’ve experienced service from a billionaire.”
JD.com appears to be doubling down on expansion and innovation. According to Liu, JD will double its delivery rider hiring target from 50,000 to 100,000 in the next three months. For riders with partners, JD plans to offer priority job placements for their spouses to help boost family income. Liu also noted that JD now employs over 710,000 people, and based on current growth, expects that number to exceed one million within the next four years.
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