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Start-ups
Articles about early-stage companies; pre-IPO, including those still being funded by angel investors, private equity or venture capitalists.
TabbyML co-founder Lucy Gao (left) and SenseTime chief financial officer Wang Zheng highlight the benefits for AI firms in Hong Kong on Tuesday at the SCMP’s China Conference 2025. Photo: Eugene Lee
Artificial intelligence

Hong Kong’s financial centre status gives it an edge in AI market, experts say

SenseTime chief financial officer Wang Zheng says ‘having easy access to capital is extremely important’ for AI companies.

Robotics

Chinese start-up Mirror Me’s robot dog outpaces Boston Dynamics’ WildCat

DeepSeek

DeepSeek’s LinkedIn AI job listings show hunger for international Chinese talent

Artificial intelligence

Alibaba AI model-based agentic framework tops global ranking

DeepSWE, trained on the Qwen3-32B model, scored 59 per cent accuracy in the latest industry benchmark to outperform a DeepSeek-V3 variant.

Artificial intelligence agents are software programs that are capable of autonomously performing tasks on behalf of a user or another system. Photo: Shutterstock
Artificial intelligence

Alibaba leads US$14 million funding round in Chinese AI agent start-up

AI agents, designed to perform specific tasks, are increasingly seen as the future of business automation.

ByteDance

ByteDance pushes recruitment of fresh robotics talent as AI remains a priority

The new recruits are expected to work under ByteDance’s Seed department, which handles AI-related research and development initiatives.

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Icons and Influencers

Why In Lieu is sourcing ‘premium water’ from Henan’s mountains

In Lieu works with Hong Kong hotels, and organisations like Art Central and the Midnight Runners, but is inspired by the wider choice of water in the US where even Beyoncé and Jaden Smith have founded water businesses.

Joanne Zhou’s start-up In Lieu offers Hong Kong consumers what she says is a more sustainable choice: water drawn from the mountains of Henan and supplied in cans not plastic bottles. Photo: Jocelyn Tam
China technology

From Cambridge to Suzhou: a Chinese AI start-up’s journey to unicorn status

For AI Speech, swapping Britain for bustling Suzhou was key to propelling the company to a billion-dollar valuation.

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Hong Kong politics

Hong Kong leader taps 2 tech heads from Hangzhou’s ‘Little Dragons’ as advisers

Han Bicheng, CEO of BrainCo, and Wang Xingxing, head of Unitree Robotics, are among three new additions to John Lee’s advisory council.

China economy

Opinion | China is taking Silicon Valley’s market ‘hacks’ to a whole new level

From ‘blitzscaling’ to leveraging network effects, China is using these same methods to dominate supply chain and disrupt markets.

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Companies and industrial hubs like Hangzhou are implementing a “whole of society” approach towards developing and deploying emerging technologies. Photo: Shutterstock
Artificial intelligence

Anthropic wins ruling on use of copyrighted books to train AI

A US judge rules that training AI on copyrighted books is fair use, but the downloading of pirated books is not.

Anthropic’s use of copyrighted books for AI training is fair use, a US judge has ruled. Photo: AP
DeepSeek

How DeepSeek founder’s doubt led serial entrepreneur to embrace his gift of gab

Founder of defunct smartphone brand Smartisan said DeepSeek’s Liang Wenfeng told him he was among the best in China at ‘earning a living by talking’.

Robotics

Unitree Robotics now a unicorn with ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent funding

The Chinese humanoid and robot dog maker is valued at US$1.3 billion in its latest financing round.

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IPO

Former Hong Kong exchange CEO Charles Li aims to list start-up

Li’s Micro Connect is among six companies that filed for listings on Wednesday, joining 200 companies waiting to list in the city.

Former Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX) CEO Charles Li, photographed in Central on September 26, 2022. Photo: Xiaomei Chen
DeepSeek

DeepSeek’s updated R1 AI model matches Google, Anthropic in coding benchmark

The updated reasoning model, released in May, performed well against leading US models in the real-time WebDev Arena tests.

A DeepSeek poster seen during the 2025 Global Developer Conference on February 22 in Shanghai. Photo: VCG via Getty Images
Artificial intelligence

DeepSeek rival MiniMax says its first AI reasoning model halves compute of R1

The Shanghai-based firm said its open-source M1 model is more efficient in tasks including maths and coding than the popular DeepSeek-R1.

China’s private sector

China internet pioneer urges students to put off graduate school, start-up plans

Sohu.com founder Charles Zhang says college students need to ‘gain some real experience’ by working for a company.

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Robotics

China’s robotics market set to double in four years: Morgan Stanley

Robotics is a key part of the Made in China 2025 initiative, launched a decade ago to position the country at the forefront of hi-tech industries.

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A humanoid robot walks down the runway at a fashion show in Tianjin, northern China. Photo: Xinhua
Artificial intelligence

How a Chinese AI start-up helps Nike, Gap, Urban Revivo predict fashion trends

Hangzhou Zhiyi Technology’s operations reflect how AI adoption in mainland China is expanding and transforming various industries.

Artificial intelligence

Meet Goku, the Chinese quant fund with AI ambitions beyond finance

The Shanghai-based firm and subsidiary AllMind are pursuing AI-assisted scientific discovery, drawing comparisons with DeepSeek.

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Artificial intelligence

Hong Kong plans new AI supercomputing centre to boost tech hub status

The facilities will provide computing power for the Greater Bay Area and beyond, says innovation chief Sun Dong during a tech show in Paris.

Sun Dong, Secretary for Innovation, Technology and Industry, speaks at the VivaTech fair in Paris on Friday. Photo: Xinmei Shen
Banking & finance

US venture capital firm to unload stakes in 40 Chinese tech start-ups

Chinese venture capitalists, government-backed funds expected to fill a funding gap left by retreating international investors, analyst says.

Eight Roads has invested in companies including autonomous-driving firm Pony.ai. Photo: AFP
Indonesia

How Indonesian fintech firm is bridging funding gaps for women entrepreneurs

Amartha leverages technology to provide loans to women running small businesses in remote areas, but challenges such as lack of digital literacy remain.

China technology

Hong Kong backs start-ups at VivaTech show in push for European market

Local start-ups from HKSTP and Cyberport will appear at the Hong Kong Tech Pavilion at VivaTech from June 11 to 14.

VR and AR

Chinese AR glasses maker Rokid is going global with Alibaba partnership

Rokid will launch its AR Spatial glasses on AliExpress through the platform’s ‘BigSave’ programme, shaving off about US$100 off the US$650 eyewear.

Rokid is launching its AR glasses overseas this month using Alibaba’s AliExpress platform. Photo: Rokid
Robotics

Unitree eyes pre-IPO fundraising, valuing robot maker up to US$2 billion: report

Raising fresh capital casts a spotlight on how China’s leading humanoid robot makers are pushing forward mass production this year.

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Passersby film a Unitree G1 humanoid robot at a park in Hangzhou, capital of eastern Zhejiang province. Photo: Reuters
Robotics

Beijing academy unveils ‘RoboBrain’ AI model for China’s humanoids

The launch comes amid efforts to leverage rapidly advancing AI technology to improve the capability of robots.

Fintech

Fintech start-up Syfe bolsters Hong Kong expansion after new funding round

Singapore-based Syfe’s expansion plans reflect the city’s position as the largest hedge fund and cross-border wealth management hub in Asia.

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