Experts Map Out Survival Rules for OPCs

With the advent of the AI era, the entrepreneurial spark of One-person Companies (OPCs) is gaining significant momentum. As numerous cities roll out targeted policies and establish funds to support OPC development, industry experts at the inaugural "AI+OPC" Innovation and Development Conference in Hangzhou recently shared insights into how OPCs can thrive.

Why was OPC impossible in the past but possible today? In the view of many experts, what appears to be an accidental novelty is in fact an inevitable product of the times.

Wang Jiangping, former vice minister of industry and information technology, said the surge of OPCs is an inevitable outcome of the increasing accessibility of AI technology. The threshold for entrepreneurship has dropped significantly, unleashing individual creativity on an unprecedented scale.

"One person, one set of AI tools, and one complete industrial chain — this new paradigm enables more creative and skilled individuals to pursue innovation and entrepreneurship at extremely low cost," Wang said.

Pan Yunhe, former executive vice president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a professor at Zhejiang University, called the emergence of OPCs "a ripple effect of AI-driven industrial transformation."

Intelligent platforms provide not only computing power and data, but also models and a wide range of basic knowledge and technologies, greatly reducing the barriers to OPC formation, according to Pan. Liang Gui, former executive vice governor of Jiangxi province, pointed out that three forces are driving the rapid growth of OPCs. The first is the maturity of the tool chain: From 2024, AI has evolved from a mere assistant into a digital employee matrix, enabling a founder to hire a team of digital employees.

The second is extremely low startup costs: Data shows that more than 90 percent of OPCs are launched with less than 500 USD, and the minimum monthly cost for an OPC in China can be less than 3,000 RMB.

The third is China's unique policy ecosystem: More than 30 cities across the country have already introduced special OPC policies. In 2025, Shangcheng district in Hangzhou took the lead in Zhejiang province by issuing a "Six Ones" special policy package. The "Six Ones" are one plan, one policy, one guideline, one fund, one case study and one competition/conference to pitch and scale ideas.

According to the National OPC Development Observation Report (2026), the industry currently faces many pain points: Local support policies are often highly homogenized, the overall supporting ecosystem remains inadequate, and there is a common tendency to emphasize hardware investment over software empowerment, and resource allocation over demand matching. In addition, more than 60 percent of entrepreneurs have cognitive bias regarding the OPC model, and the overall survival rate is below 10 percent.

In Liang's view, these failures can be attributed to five main "ways to die": the perfectionism trap, tool addiction, pseudo-demand self-indulgence, pricing phobia, and cash flow rupture.

Wang said OPC development faces issues such as amplified AI legal risks, confusion of legal personality, liability definition, data compliance and intellectual property ownership. In addition, there are inconsistent regulatory rules and incomplete compliance systems at the supervisory level.

Therefore, to promote the steady and sustainable development of "AI+OPC," all sectors of society need to build consensus and work together.

According to Wang, OPCs should adhere to the principle of technology for good and strive for alignment at the value, institutional and philosophical levels. He emphasized the need to focus on key core technology bottlenecks, build an open and collaborative industrial ecosystem, deeply engage with the real economy, and empower the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries. At the same time, talent development systems should be strengthened to cultivate a fertile ground for innovation.

Liang proposed a shift from investing in hardware to investing in people, from venue leasing to opening up real-world scenarios, from cash subsidies to computing and model vouchers, and from isolated entrepreneurship to community synergy. "Make money first, then pursue perfection. AI is your employee, and you are the CEO. One-person entrepreneurship does not mean fighting alone; joining a community is a necessity for OPC survival."

Source: Science and Technology Daily