In 2001, after graduating from university, I joined a large foreign IT company and worked there for 3 years.

Later, because I wasn’t very good at office politics and was marginalized everywhere, I resigned to strike out on my own.

During my first year or so after leaving, I tried everything: selling clothes, building websites for businesses, selling computers, doing e-commerce… As early as 2005, I ran an online parenting and baby shopping mall and opened a Taobao store.

After hustling around for a while, I didn’t make much money.

Later, I wanted to go back to a regular job, only to find that big companies no longer wanted me. The only ones willing to give me a chance were some small business owners, and they were basically offering pure commission with no base salary.

That didn’t matter. I treated it as accumulating experience. I only picked companies in the internet industry and worked for these bosses for free for over a year.

At the same time, I was constantly tinkering with websites on my own.

In those years, the internet was just emerging, and I felt there must be opportunities in it. I was young, energetic, and had no money. Whenever I had an idea, I quickly tried it; if it didn’t work out, I moved on to the next one.

I built dozens of different types of websites, and eventually, two of them suddenly took off.

One was a quite well-known gaming forum at the time, and the other was an internet literature website with huge traffic. At their peak, the website traffic once entered the top 50 nationwide, which also earned me my first pot of gold in life.

Looking back now, it was really just three things: a bit of vision, the courage to try things quickly, and being young and energetic. Plus, having no money forced me to work desperately hard.

From then on, I never went back to a regular job and devoted myself fully to my own projects.

At first, it was just me. Later, as the business grew, it went from one person to two, three, and then to a dozen or dozens of people. At its peak, the company had over 60 employees.

This journey has lasted for over twenty years.

Over these years, my principle has always been simple:

If there is a lot of money and a lot of work, hire more people; if money is tight and work is scarce, increase revenue, reduce expenditure, and downsize the staff.

The company has had expansions and layoffs. But no matter whether business was good or bad, I would always set aside the salaries and severance pay for the employees in the account first, ensuring I never owed anyone anything.

When I could afford 60 people, I kept 60 people; when I couldn’t, I scaled back. Doing business has its ups and downs; it’s very normal.

During the years when the company was growing the fastest, I constantly wanted to find venture capital to develop even faster.

I met many investors and quite a few famous figures in the internet circle at the time. We met, chatted, and ate, negotiating round after round. In the end, I didn’t raise a single penny.

Maybe I am really not suited for fundraising. I’m not good at telling stories, nor am I good at bragging. I could run the business, and I could grow the company from one person to over 60, but I never learned how to raise capital.

Interestingly, some of the employees I trained went out to start their own businesses later and turned out to be better at fundraising than me. As far as I know, some of them quickly raised millions after leaving.

The boss couldn’t raise money himself, but the people he trained were all incredible at it.

In recent years, business hasn’t been as good as before, the company is already very small, and I no longer want to raise funds.

What I think more about now is: if the price is right, I might as well just sell the company. I’ve had off-and-on discussions with some buyers, but the valuation for a small company really isn’t high; the offers were basically around 2x PE.

Actually, I can understand it. Investors are not that familiar with the business and have to bear the risks, so they certainly want to leave a sufficient margin of safety. But from the perspective of a small company boss, the math is calculated differently: a 2x PE is roughly two years of profit. As long as I am not short of cash, the company’s capital chain is fine, and I still have the energy to work, I might as well just run it myself for another two years.

So the buyer thinks the price is reasonable, while the seller feels there’s no need to sell.

It’s not like I can’t work anymore, so I’ll just keep going.

Right now, what I’m still running is Zixia Games, a discount gaming platform connected to thousands of games.

Business has been getting harder over the years, the money to be made is getting less and less, and the company has long since shrunk from its peak of over 60 people to just a few people now.

However, the times have indeed changed.

AI Agents are getting stronger and stronger, and the technical work in my company has now basically been entirely handed over to AI.

Things that used to require a technical team can now be done by just me leading a bunch of AI Agents.

So what if business gets a little worse?

If I can’t afford a large team, I’ll keep fewer people; if I can’t afford a few people, the worst-case scenario is that it’s just me left in the end, working alongside a bunch of AI Agents.

As long as I can still make 6,000 yuan a month to pay the server and AI monthly fees, I’ll keep playing.

If one day I can’t even make 6,000 yuan, then I’ll just shut down the site.

And go back to working for someone else.

Over twenty years ago, didn’t I start from zero just like this?

Resigned from a big company, tried everything; didn’t make money, wanted to go back to work but nobody wanted me; no salary, so I worked for small business owners for free; tinkered with a dozen or twenty websites on my own, and finally two took off.

Then I grew from one person to over 60 people.

Now, it’s slowly shrinking from over 60 people back to a few.

Maybe one day, it will really go back to just one person.

It’s just that over twenty years ago, it was truly just me alone.

Now, if I’m the only one left, at least I’ll have a bunch of AI Agents to keep me company and keep working.

If I can keep doing it, I will; if not, I’ll change paths.

What’s the big deal?

I am Zixia, the founder of Zixia Games.

Zixia Games: game.zixia.com