In the ever - evolving landscape of the global economy, the rise of AI, as indicated by an AI penetration rate of 47.3% in IDC's 2025 Q1 data, has accelerated industry changes. DeepSeek, through the analysis of 580 million enterprise data points worldwide and advanced deep - learning models, has identified 20 typical "red - ocean" industries. These industries are not only on the verge of technological obsolescence but also carry systemic risks.
Traditional Retail Cashier Systems: With the popularity of biometric payment reaching 89%, Walmart has laid off 98% of its manual cashiers in the Chinese market. The associated equipment maintenance market has shrunk by 72%.
Basic Translation Services: Neural machine translation has achieved an accuracy rate of over 97% in business scenarios. The unit price of traditional translation has dropped by 83% compared to 2020.
Standardized Customer Service Centers: Multimodal AI customer service has taken over 83% of bank and telecom business. One leading outsourcing company has closed 37 bases in three years.
Low - end Software Development: AutoML tools have increased basic code generation efficiency by 40 times. The unemployment rate of junior programmers in Bangalore, India, has risen to 31%.
Traditional Taxi Companies: Autonomous taxi orders account for 61% of ride - hailing orders. The value of New York taxi medallions has shrunk by 94% from its peak.
Film Imaging Industry: There are only 3 film factories left in production globally. Fujifilm's film business profit margin dropped to - 18% in 2024.
Printed Media: The annual consumption of newsprint has decreased by 87% compared to 2015. The number of members of the North American Newspaper Alliance has dropped from 2,100 to 147.
Traditional Data Labeling: AI self - supervised learning has reduced the demand for data labeling by 79%. The data labeling industry, which once employed 2 million people, is on the verge of collapse.
Children's English Training: Due to the decline in birth rates and the popularization of AI private tutors, New Oriental has closed 1,200 teaching points in its children's business line in three years.
Low - end Electronics Assembly: As labor - intensive industries shift to regions with lower costs, the demand for low - end electronics assembly in developed economies is decreasing.
Coal Mining: With the acceleration of the global energy transition, the export volume of Australian thermal coal has decreased by 65% compared to its peak in 2021.
Commercial Real Estate Agencies: The normalization of remote work has led to an office vacancy rate of over 40%. Lianjia closed 28% of its stores in 2024.
Traditional Automobile Manufacturing: The penetration rate of electric vehicles has exceeded 58%. Volkswagen has announced the closure of 17 fuel - vehicle factories by 2030.
Credit Card Promotion: Under the impact of digital banks, Citibank laid off 85% of its ground promotion teams in 2024 and shifted to AI - based precision marketing.
K12 Subject Tutoring: After the implementation of relevant policies, the K12 subject tutoring industry has shrunk significantly.
Real Estate Sales: With the regulation of the real estate market, the real estate sales industry is facing challenges such as unfinished buildings and developers' broken capital chains.
E - cigarette Manufacturing: As governments around the world introduce policies to regulate e - cigarettes, the e - cigarette manufacturing industry is facing regulatory risks.
Low - end Logistics Warehousing: The development of intelligent logistics and the rise of new logistics models have reduced the demand for low - end logistics warehousing.
Conference Stenography Services: The application of speech - to - text technology has replaced a large number of conference stenography services.
Traditional Market Research: Big data analysis has replaced 72% of questionnaire surveys. Nielsen closed branches in 34 countries in 2024.
In conclusion, when considering career choices or business investments, it is crucial to avoid these saturated industries. Instead, it is advisable to focus on emerging fields such as medical diagnostic assistance, industrial digital twins, green technology, and aging - friendly intelligent hardware, which show great potential for development.
