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ByteDance’s short drama platform, Hongguo, has responded to allegations that the AI-generated series Peach Blossom Hairpin was involved in unauthorized facial likeness use. The platform said that after receiving a complaint, it conducted a 72-hour review and found that the producer failed to provide evidence of compliant use of the materials, determining the case to constitute a violation of platform rules and contractual obligations. Hongguo subsequently removed the series in full and suspen

The second-generation Doubao AI smartphone is expected to launch in the second quarter of this year, according to tech bloggers, as ByteDance deepens its push into system-level AI on mobile devices. The device continues ByteDance’s partnership with ZTE’s Nubia brand and will focus on system-level AI and cross-application autonomous operations, aiming to enable a new interaction model in which AI performs tasks on behalf of users, sources said. Two of China’s top five smartphone makers have begun

Lei Jun, founder of Xiaomi, hosted a livestream that lasted more than three hours at the company’s auto factory in Beijing’s Yizhuang district and offered a detailed teardown of the new-generation SU7 sedan. During the broadcast, Lei, alongside automotive safety expert Zhu Xichan, examined the vehicle component by component, covering exterior paintwork, forged wheels, interior materials and a 7.1.4-channel audio system, as well as structural elements such as aerospace-grade aluminum anti-collisi

Stellantis is reportedly discussing a potential EV project with Leapmotor for its idled Brampton plant in Canada. The talks are still preliminary, and no decision has been made. The Brampton site had previously been set to build a new Jeep SUV, but Stellantis later canceled that plan and moved the program to a US factory. Since then, the company has been discussing future options for the plant with Canadian officials. Leapmotor is already a Stellantis partner. Stellantis bought a 20% stake

OpenClaw announced on April 1 that it has launched an official China mirror for ClawHub, allowing users to search for skills through a localized access point aimed at improving stability and access speed for users in China. According to the site description, the mirror is a localized skills site built on top of ClawHub and supported by infrastructure from ByteDance. The notice also said ByteDance only provides technical support for the mirror service and does not make any express or implied g

On Wednesday, the Wuhan Municipal Public Security Bureau’s Traffic Management Bureau issued a police report stating that beginning at 20:57 on March 31, multiple Apollo Go autonomous taxis suddenly came to a halt on major roads and elevated expressways in Wuhan, causing widespread traffic congestion. Fortunately, no injuries or fatalities were reported. A preliminary investigation indicates that the incident was caused by a system malfunction. Apollo Go in Wuhan According to on-site wit

Previously on Tech Odyssey Series: In the last episode of Tech Odyssey, we visited Sound Particles, a 17-person Portuguese company whose technology has made its way into films like Dune and Oppenheimer. This time, we head to Omniflow to see how something as ordinary as a streetlight can be turned into a multi-use system for energy, charging, and connectivity. In most cities, streetlights are easy to ignore. By day, they disappear into the background. By night, they do one simple job: li

Huawei said in its 2025 annual report that revenue reached CNY880.9 billion and net profit came in at CNY68 billion, with overall performance remaining in line with forecast. The company also said it invested CNY192.3 billion in R&D during the year, equal to 21.8% of annual revenue and marking a record high. Huawei said its computing business continued to capture opportunities from AI, while its consumer business pushed the HarmonyOS ecosystem to a new stage. By the end of 2025, more than

Citing people familiar with the matter, management at BYD said during a Monday analyst briefing that the company is confident its exports will reach 1.5 million units this year. The annual export target has been raised to 1.5 million units, an increase of 200,000 from the 1.3 million units set in January, representing year-on-year growth of more than 40%. As for whether BYD will ultimately achieve the 1.5 million export goal, this will be revealed when the company discloses its production and sa

Apple Intelligence briefly appeared for some iPhone users in the Chinese mainland early Tuesday, before the update was pulled. The incident suggested the feature may be technically ready for the market, even though it has not officially launched. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman said the rollout was accidental and that Apple still has not received regulatory approval for the Chinese mainland. He added that the company does not currently have plans for an imminent release. [TechNode reporting]

Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun said on Monday the company has launched a dedicated AI hiring programme and will invest 16 billion yuan ($2.2 billion) in AI-related research and development and capital spending this year. The move comes as Xiaomi ramps up efforts in foundation models and embodied AI robotics, where it has already made notable progress, Lei said. The hiring drive spans senior talent, global campus recruitment and internships, covering roles in large model training and inference, on-device AI

According to DigiTimes, TSMC’s 3nm process capacity has entered an extremely rare state of “overload,” as a fierce battle for capacity sweeps across the entire semiconductor supply chain. The report notes that from leading GPU and CPU designers to hyperscale cloud providers such as Amazon and Microsoft, nearly every major player is scrambling to secure orders from TSMC. However, the foundry’s manufacturing capability has now become the industry’s biggest bottleneck, with actual capacity falling

Sony PlayStation China announced that, due to ongoing global economic pressures, it will increase the suggested retail prices of its China-market PS5 Slim and PS5 Pro models, with the new pricing taking effect on April 2. The PS5 Slim Digital Edition will rise from RMB 3,499 ($485) to RMB 3,999 ($555), marking an increase of RMB 500 ($70). The standard PS5 Slim will see a smaller hike, going from RMB 4,299 ($600) to RMB 4,399 ($615), up RMB 100 ($15). Meanwhile, the PS5 Pro will increase fro

Founded in 2024, MOVA is a Chinese smart home appliance brand focused on AI-driven intelligent living solutions. The company began with cleaning devices such as robotic vacuum cleaners and has quickly expanded into personal care and outdoor smart products across multiple categories. Leveraging a mature supply chain and advanced algorithm capabilities, MOVA continuously iterates its products. The latest product lineup demonstrates that MOVA has evolved from a single cleaning tool into a compre

According to South Korean media BusinessKorea, major memory chip manufacturers Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix are making large-scale facility investments in their factories in China to upgrade their process technology and production capacity. Amid a global surge in AI investments and the resulting memory semiconductor shortage, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix are mobilizing all available capacity, including their Chinese factories, to increase supply to customers. Last year, Samsung and SK

China’s National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA) released its latest batch of game approvals, granting licenses to 130 domestic online games and three imported titles this month. Approved domestic titles included Tencent’s Li Li’s Tiny World, 37 Interactive Entertainment’s Little Helmet Adventure, and Kingnet’s Legend of Heroes. For imported titles, three new games were cleared, including Battle Knights by Xiamen Kuanyu, Aftermath Inc. by Shanghai Qingyuyou, and Shaiya: Conflict by N

RoboSense reported its first quarterly profit since inception in the fourth quarter of 2025, with net profit reaching RMB104 million ($14.5 million) and revenue rising 46.1% year-over-year to RMB751 million. The company said this marked a clear inflection point in its operations, driven in large part by rapid growth in its robotics business. The robotics segment emerged as the standout for the year. RoboSense said robotics LiDAR shipments reached about 303,000 units in 2025, ranking first glo

Chinese gaming firm Papergames has recently posted multiple AI robotics-related roles on recruitment platforms, including positions such as AI robotics structural lead, hardware engineer, and product manager focused on hardware supply chains. The move signals the company’s formal entry into the AI companion robot space, as it seeks to extend the emotional value of its virtual characters into the physical world. Credit: Love and Deepspace Integration of virtual IP and physical hardware P

TikTok is testing a dedicated short-drama feed in the US and several other markets, while also moving toward original production, Business Insider reported. The report said TikTok has started casting for a new soap opera-style short-drama project and previously filed a US trademark application for “TikTok Drama,” covering services including the development and production of short drama series, television programs, and webisodes. Short dramas, typically split into one- to five-minute vertical

Tencent has recently stepped up hiring from ByteDance, bringing in senior talent from its Seed AI team, including roles in visual AI platforms, infrastructure engineering, training infrastructure, and reinforcement learning algorithms. The hires come as Tencent accelerates development of its large language models, with plans to launch its next-generation Hunyuan 3.0 system in the second quarter of 2026, aiming to compete with leading global models such as GPT-4.5. [36Kr, in Chinese]