When Zhou Yuxiang, founder and CEO of Shanghai-headquartered Black Lake Technologies, wanted to sell his Artificial Intelligence (AI) automation solutions to millions of family-run factories across China, he came up with an unconventional strategy: hiring food delivery workers to make sales.His entire sales team, hired from various industrial cities, survived a gruelling five-day boot camp on articulating how AI can solve specific manufacturing pain points.“They are very street-smart,” the 36-year-old said in an exclusive interview with the China-morning-post" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="12558" data-entity-type="organization">South China Morning Post. “Good college graduates are often thin-skinned. They linger in front of a factory and can’t get in.
SRCSouth China Morning Post
LANGEN
LEANCenter-Right
WORDS98
ENT6
MON · 2026-07-27 · 02:00 GMTBRIEF NSR-2026-0727-96260
NSR-2026-0727-96260News Report·EN·Human Interest
Black Lake CEO’s strategy to sell AI solutions to factories: turn to food couriers
Zhou Yuxiang, CEO of Shanghai-based Black Lake Technologies, has adopted an unconventional sales strategy to market his AI automation solutions to Chinese factories. He is hiring food delivery workers to act as his sales team.
Natalie WongSouth China Morning PostFiled 2026-07-27 · 02:00 GMTLean · Center-RightRead · 1 min
South China Morning PostFIG 01
Reading time
1min
Word count
98words
Sources cited
1cited
Entities identified
6entities
Quality score
100%
§ 01
Briefing Summary
AI-generatedNEWSAR · AI
Zhou Yuxiang, CEO of Shanghai-based Black Lake Technologies, has adopted an unconventional sales strategy to market his AI automation solutions to Chinese factories. He is hiring food delivery workers to act as his sales team. These individuals, recruited from industrial cities, undergo a rigorous five-day training program focused on explaining how AI can address specific manufacturing challenges. Zhou believes these "street-smart" workers are more effective than some college graduates who may struggle to gain entry into factories. This approach aims to overcome access barriers and effectively communicate the benefits of AI to a vast number of family-run businesses.
Confidence 0.85Sources 1Claims 4Entities 6
§ 02
Article analysis
Model · rule-basedFraming
Human Interest
Technology
Tone
Measured
AI-assessed
CalmNeutralAlarmist
Factuality
0.60 / 1.00
Mixed
LowHigh
Sources cited
1
Limited
FewMany
§ 03
Key claims
4 extracted01
Good college graduates are often 'thin-skinned' and struggle to enter factories.
quoteZhou Yuxiang
Confidence
1.00
02
Food delivery workers are considered 'street-smart' and can gain access to factories.
quoteZhou Yuxiang
Confidence
1.00
03
Black Lake CEO Zhou Yuxiang hired food delivery workers to sell AI automation solutions to factories.
factualZhou Yuxiang
Confidence
1.00
04
The sales team underwent a five-day boot camp on articulating AI's manufacturing benefits.
factualarticle
Confidence
0.90
§ 04
Full report
1 min read · 98 words§ 05
Entities
6 identifiedKey playerOppositionContextPositiveNeutralNegative
§ 06
Keywords & salience
7 termsai automation solutions
1.00
sales strategy
0.90
manufacturing pain points
0.80
food delivery workers
0.70
black lake technologies
0.60
china factories
0.50
boot camp
0.40
§ 07
Topic connections
Interactive graph No topic relationship data available yet. This graph will appear once topic relationships have been computed.