This Week in China Tech
Xiaomi, Baidu and Sequoia China
MON AUGUST 15TH, 2022 2:15 PM MONTREAL, CANADA
Hey Guys,
I usually like to go into more detail but some buzz around a few topics I’m watching has caught my attention. The East vs. West axis doesn’t take away from China’s growth in the big picture, nor does its internal dramas.
Xiaomi unveils its new humanoid robot CyberOne
I’ve been thinking a lot more about robotics than usual these days in my coverage on A.I. Survey.
I have a column about Robotics here.
That Xiaomi has this CyberOne announcement days before Tesla’s own event is pretty telling.
Xiaomi unveiled a new bipedal robot, CyberOne, during its big launch event this week.
The company revealed a Spot-like robot dog, CyberDog, last year.
Xiaomi highlights CyberOne's emotional detection, saying it can recognize "45 classifications of human emotion".
For robotics we now have Hyundai owned Boston Dynamics, Xiaomi, Xpeng and Tesla all looking like they have some skin in the game, among others. You will notice China and Japan tend to be better in robotics, since it impacts their society more, they have more incentive to innovate here.
Tesla’s own AI event is on August 19th, 2022.
Robots will 'upend our idea' of the economy
It’s a bit hard to tell how serious Xiaomi is as a robotics maker. The PR is super amusing. (Video)
Baidu is Launching its Robo Taxi Pilot
About a week ago Baidu announced its major trials in two cities. Chinese internet giant Baidu has secured permits to offer a fully driverless commercial robotaxi service, with no human driver present, in Chongqing and Wuhan via the company’s autonomous ride-hailing unit, Apollo Go.
I’m really bullish on China’s ability to get ahead with automation technologies. However it’s rising youth unemployment, slowdown and aging populations is very worrisome combined with a real-estate developer debt crisis that is going to be very challenging in 2023.
If you think of Baidu as an A.I. pure play company it is approximately on part to Google’s Waymo company for robo-taxis. However China will scale the technology much faster due to less emphasis potentially on safety and having such a larger market.
I consider Baidu’s stock somewhat undervalued all things considered. BIDU 0.00%↑ How does this company have a valuation of only $48 billion. It's because Americans have been brainwashed into thinking that Chinese stocks are somehow "uninvestable". If you look at China's recent stock market history volatility and a predictable 3-year pattern is there.
Sequoia Capital China opens start-up accelerator
During a recession startups and Venture capital need to be agile and come up with new ways to accelerate the future of innovation and technology.
I think Sequoia knows what it’s doing with this. According to the SCMP:
The venture capital firm plans to provide US$1 million in funding to each successful graduate of its inaugural six-week accelerator program.
The move comes as China’s tech sector grapples with the fallout from a regulatory crackdown, a weakening economy and geopolitical headwinds. China’s innovation sector is really hungry and China’s impact on the global economy will only become bigger.
The U.S. based tech media narrative somehow omits a lot of the economic reality of our future and how the global economy will actually work. I’m very bullish on Chinese tech startups, whether its EV startups or many other domains.
China’s Venture Capital System will Thrive in 21st Century
Even with a common prosperity narrative, Tech regulation and seemingly anti-technology regulation in China, the CCP needs its own BigTech dynasty ecosystem to thrive and help fund the startups of tomorrow, and that’s exactly what they have been doing for years with BAT’s leadership and involvement in the ecosystem.
For the global economy a lot of future growth will have to come from BRIC countries and the developing world like Nigeria, Indonesia, India, Brazil and so forth. China’s influence on the venture capital structure of the future will also only become more important.
In my view, China will likely be behind a majority of the top startups that form in the 2025 to 2035 period globally, in one way or another. China understand how to build a ByteDance, or a Huawei or a Xiaomi, at this point. It’s all about scalability and China now understands better how market leaders can be groomed and how they can grow globally to be global corporate players while fostering the long-term objectives of the State, and socialism with Chinese characteristics, whatever that might be or become.
Can Chinese Robots Scale?
What are the chances Tesla’s robots will just be so much better than Xiaomi, Boston Dynamics or Xpeng for that matter? Xiaomi is investing a great deal in the development of its robots.
As Lei Jun point out during the launch event, "CyberOne’s AI and mechanical capabilities are all self-developed by Xiaomi Robotics Lab. We have invested heavily in R&D spanning various areas, including software, hardware and algorithms innovation."
With ByteDance mimicking Meta with VR and Amazon with A.I. in healthcare, what would prevent it from getting into robotics or the Cloud eventually? Alibaba had facial recognition payments years before Amazon has palm reading checkout. It’s all very bizarre that Americans don’t understand what China is becoming.
What do you think?
Thanks for reading!