JD.com founder vows to protect Chinese jobs from AI and robots

JD.com Inc. founder Liu Qiangdong vowed to prevent the e-commerce firm’s 900,000-strong workforce from losing their jobs to automation, seeking to allay growing fears that the adoption of AI and robotics could replace workers.

The company, which is one of the country’s largest employers by headcount, will “do everything possible to safeguard employment for hundreds of thousands of staff, including blue-collar workers,” Liu said in an internal speech on Wednesday, according to a video circulating on social media.

“JD.com will not fire a single front-line worker replaced by machines,” he said. JD didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment.