Details of DeepSeek's second funding round of 105.5 billion yuan revealed, with vivo, Meituan, Xiaohongshu and others among investors

Headlines

1. He Xiaopeng: If you want to prove your smart driving is strong, then you should go abroad

2. 39-year-old former Unitree executive leaves to start a business, gets dismissed by investors as too old and labeled "old geezer"! Fundraising is like minus 40 degrees

3. Chery executive responds to Luxeed's independence: It should be more like a new-force company, not a "larger" traditional automaker

4. Breaking! Meituan announcement: Two post-80s executives promoted to vice president

5. Details of DeepSeek's 105.5 billion yuan financing exposed! vivo, Meituan, Xiaohongshu and others on investor list

6. Meta partners with Chinese company Fourier to build humanoid robot prototype, billed as physical embodiment of the Muse model

7. Alibaba reveals details of China-market Apple Intelligence: Siri directly calls Qwen, users can choose whether to enable it

8. OpenAI announces: Some ChatGPT tasks and Codex will share quota, effective from December Today's Headlines

He Xiaopeng: If you want to prove your smart driving is strong, then you should go abroad

October 31 news: He Xiaopeng, head of XPeng Motors, recently spoke publicly and set a new definition for the industry's benchmark for comparing intelligent driving capabilities: if an automaker wants to prove that its smart driving technology is truly solid, the most direct way to verify it is to take its products to overseas markets and subject them to real-world tests under different global road conditions and different traffic regulations.

He Xiaopeng admitted that since the brand's founding, XPeng has engraved intelligent driving into its core DNA, but for so many years in the domestic market, there has never been a lack of doubts about XPeng's smart driving capabilities, and related industry debates have never stopped. At this Paris Motor Show, local European automakers and media were initially skeptical too, and only after firsthand experience did they express recognition and willingness to begin cooperation.

He Xiaopeng stated directly on site that people had told him before that if you want to prove your smart driving is truly strong enough, then you should go abroad and accept the test of the global market, and XPeng has now truly done so. By next year, XPeng's full-scenario intelligent driving technology will officially move from China to the global market, completing localized adaptation and deployment in more countries. (Kuai Technology) Domestic News

39-year-old former Unitree executive leaves to start a business, gets dismissed by investors as too old and labeled "old geezer"! Fundraising is like minus 40 degrees

November 1 news: According to media reports, Chen Yonggang, former deputy general manager of Unitree Robotics, has now become the founder of embodied intelligence startup Beijing Guangli Yueqian. At the end of August this year, just one week after Unitree Robotics completed its IPO, Chen Yonggang formally submitted his resignation and plunged into the wave of entrepreneurship.

Recently, Chen Yonggang has been shuttling between Beijing and Shenzhen to meet investors intensively. He met with nearly 20 investment institutions in total, and the feedback he received was very cold: many investors stated directly that they are no longer looking at the embodied intelligence track. "Fundraising for embodied intelligence startups is not cooling down; it is already minus 40 degrees." This is Chen Yonggang's summary of the current industry capital environment.

It is understood that Chen Yonggang, 39 this year, does not come from a 985 university, and in front of a group of AI geniuses who became famous young, his age has instead become a shortcoming. In the investor visit list he compiled, he recorded a stinging comment: an investor bluntly called him an "old geezer" and rejected the investment outright simply because he was older. And the age of 39 has already been classified by the market as a industry veteran.

But beyond age, Chen Yonggang has worked at Xiaomi, Meituan, and Great Wall Motor. Even with a senior executive resume at a leading robotics company and mature commercialization experience, this round of financing in October 2026 is still difficult. The vast majority of investors have already closed the door on embodied intelligence projects. (Kuai Technology, 21st Century Business Herald)

Chery executive responds to Luxeed's independence: It should be more like a new-force company, not a "larger" traditional automaker

November 1 news: At the third-quarter media communication meeting, Qi Shilong, executive vice president of Chery Automobile Co., Ltd., responded to Luxeed's independence by saying that he hopes the Luxeed team will be more like a new-force company, rather than simply making it a "larger" traditional automaker. He said that Luxeed's independent operating capability will be improved through organizational scaling, product premiumization, and gradual brand optimization. It is reported that Luxeed will introduce new products next year, while overseas business will still be operated independently by Chery Group. (Jiemian News)

Breaking! Meituan announcement: Two post-80s executives promoted to vice president

November 1 news: Meituan recently announced its 2026 talent development and promotion list through an organizational announcement email. The email shows that Li Xiaohui, head of the Core Local Commerce Healthcare Business Unit, and Wang Jinrong, head of the Commercial Value-Added Department, have been promoted to company vice presidents.

Li Xiaohui joined the company in March 2011 and previously served as head of the Beauty and Medical Aesthetics Business Department of the former In-Store Comprehensive Business Unit. He is currently head of the Core Local Commerce/Healthcare Business Unit. Wang Jinrong joined the company in June 2015 and previously served as head of the Commercial Value-Added Department of the former Food Delivery Business Unit and the Commercial Value-Added Department of the former On-Demand Delivery Business Group. She is currently head of the Core Local Commerce/Commercial Value-Added Department.

Public reports show that many managers previously promoted in Meituan's leadership pipeline were born in the 1980s and 1985s, and this time's promoted Li Xiaohui and Wang Jinrong are also post-80s. (Kuai Technology)

Details of DeepSeek's 105.5 billion yuan financing exposed! vivo, Meituan, Xiaohongshu and others on investor list

November 1 news: According to recent foreign media reports, specific details of DeepSeek's second round of financing have been exposed. This round has raised 105.5 billion yuan (about 15.8 billion US dollars), attracting nearly 30 investors, of which state-owned capital accounted for about 27%, a sharp increase from 2% in the first round.

From the investor perspective, Tencent Holdings and CATL remain the two major investors. Tencent contributed 10 billion yuan in each of the two rounds, while CATL and its chairman Zeng Yuqun contributed 5 billion yuan and 10 billion yuan in the two rounds respectively. Other industrial investors include ChangXin Memory Technologies, SMIC, vivo, Meituan-WR, Geely Automobile, Midea Group, Luxshare Precision, Trip.com and Xiaohongshu, among others, with some companies investing between 1 billion and 3 billion yuan each.

Looking at the cumulative amount of the two financing rounds, technology companies contributed about 42%, state-owned investors accounted for about 19%, followed by venture capital and private equity institutions. Regarding the expanded financing scale, foreign media said that continuously rising prices of Nvidia's high-end chips and concerns about an AI industry bubble are the reasons DeepSeek doubled its fundraising scale midway. (China News Service)

Meta partners with Chinese company Fourier to build a humanoid robot prototype, billed as the physical embodiment of the Muse model

November 1 news: According to foreign media reports, Meta recently partnered with Chinese company Fourier to build a humanoid robot prototype named Max.

According to the introduction, this robot took three months to develop, stands nearly 5 feet (about 1.5 meters) tall, weighs about 106 pounds (about 48.1 kilograms), and is equipped with Nvidia's Thor chip. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg regards this humanoid robot as the "physical embodiment" of the Muse AI model and believes it can handle daily household chores.

The report said the two companies launched development of the Max 2 prototype in September this year. The new robot is expected to have a redesigned torso and other routine upgrades. Meta and Fourier have not yet set a launch date for the product, nor do they plan to sell the prototype. (IT Home)

Alibaba reveals details of Apple Intelligence in China: Siri directly calls Qwen, users can choose whether to enable it

November 1 news: Apple has officially announced Apple Intelligence for China, which will open testing with the latest iOS developer Beta starting November 4 and will be rolled out to Chinese users with the official release of iOS 27.3 in December.

Alibaba also officially announced its partnership with Apple to integrate Qwen into Apple Intelligence, allowing Chinese users to directly call Qwen's text and image understanding, content generation and other capabilities in Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence. Officials revealed that Siri can directly call Qwen's extensive knowledge and reply to user questions directly within Siri. Through Siri, users can also ask Qwen questions directly using documents and photos of their choosing. Alibaba stressed that user consent will be obtained before any question, document or image is sent to Qwen.

It is understood that users can independently choose whether to enable the Qwen integration. Once enabled, users can sign in with Apple or use their own Qwen App account to use Qwen in Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence. Users can decide for themselves when to use Qwen and what information to share. User requests and generated responses will not be used by Alibaba for model training, in order to protect user privacy. (Kuai Technology)

Net profit of 132 billion yuan in the first three quarters! ChangXin Technology: has negotiated long-term supply agreements with multiple leading customers

November 1 news: ChangXin Technology issued an announcement stating that in the first three quarters of 2026 it achieved operating revenue of 269.024 billion yuan, up 738.51% year on year; net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company was 132.04 billion yuan, turning from loss to profit year on year. In the third quarter, operating revenue was 118.714 billion yuan, up 613.18% year on year; net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company was 54.435 billion yuan, turning from loss to profit year on year.

ChangXin Technology said the change in performance was mainly due to global DRAM products being in short supply, with the company's product sales volume and sales prices rising sharply, combined with falling unit costs, which greatly increased product gross margin. In addition, at the earnings meeting, ChangXin Technology management said the company has negotiated long-term supply agreements with multiple leading customers to lock in medium- and long-term deterministic demand, and expects the company's fourth-quarter revenue to continue growing.

ChangXin Technology also revealed that during the reporting period it made breakthrough progress in launching new products, with DRAM products developed on the sixth-generation technology platform having completed engineering sample validation. (Kuai Technology)

Sam's Club pistachio nationwide purchase limit sparks controversy! Members can buy only one item every 30 days, scalpers seize the chance to resell at higher prices

November 1 news: Recently, Sam's Club Member's Mark salted pistachios (1.13 kg/bag) have continued to trend, and "one nut hard to find" has sparked widespread discussion. It is understood that the price of this pistachio has risen from 89 yuan at the end of last year to 99.9 yuan, and the purchase limit rules have been tightened twice within a month: the September policy was a limit of 2 items per member every 7 days, and in late October it was adjusted to a nationwide limit of 1 item per member every 30 days, with online and offline orders counted together. At the same time, online pages and store mini-programs in Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and many other places have shown sold out or restocking.

Regarding restocking time, Sam's Club customer service responded that due to multiple factors such as supply, sales and suppliers, it is temporarily unable to determine the arrival time; goods are purchased uniformly, and arrival conditions are difficult to predict. Many Sam's Club members are puzzled by this: backed by Walmart's global procurement system, why is even a nut in unstable supply? Some also question having to abide by purchase limits after paying membership fees, believing Sam's Club is engaging in hunger marketing.

The scarcity effect brought by purchase limits has also spawned a pistachio scalper industry chain: some pay to buy up stock, offering higher prices the more they collect; some ask members to place orders on their behalf; and some members take orders to buy on others' behalf. Some netizens also report that scalpers stake out outside offline stores to buy goods, supporting face-to-face transactions. The merchant says sales are booming, and purchase-limit requirements have even appeared on second-hand channels. It is understood that the root cause of the pistachio supply crunch is reduced production in the main global producing regions. (Kuai Technology)

OPPO executive new division of duties: Li Bingzhong to oversee overseas markets, Yin Wenguang to oversee phone products

November 1 news: OPPO recently issued a notice on executive appointments and division-of-duties adjustments: Senior Vice President Li Bingzhong will be fully responsible for overseas business and accountable for the operating results of OPPO and its sub-series in overseas markets; Vice President Yin Wenguang will be responsible for all phone product series and report to Chief Product Officer Liu Zuohu. Li Bingzhong is one of OPPO's earliest overseas expansion pioneers, with rich frontline practical, localized operations and global brand management experience; Yin Wenguang has long been responsible for product planning-related work. (Phoenix Technology)

DeepSeek releases a new Agent architecture

November 1 news: The DeepSeek Harness team recently published a technical article on its official WeChat account titled "Super-agent Design Exploration: Toward a More Autonomous Agent System."

DeepSeek said that improvements in model capabilities have given rise to new application forms, and Personal Agents have begun to emerge in concentrated numbers. However, existing mainstream Agent designs still struggle to support this model at the scale of multitasking and team collaboration; the upper limit of multitasking depends on human attention. Through ideas such as a two-layer architecture, event-driven design, asynchronous multi-channel interaction, separation of storage and compute, and an external Watchdog, the DeepSeek team has broken through these limits. The system takes over tedious session management and context synchronization at the underlying level, allowing humans to move further up from specific execution details to higher-level decision-making and acceptance.

DeepSeek calls this Agent form and its system architecture Super-agent. The article mentions that at present, an internal Super-agent instance built on this approach has been running continuously, participating in daily problem reproduction and fixing, code review responses and iteration of DeepSeek Harness itself. When team members report software problems in a group chat, even if no one actively @s the AI, it can identify potential defects and try in the background to reproduce the problem and find a fix. (Yicai)

Double 11 Tokens listed on multiple e-commerce platforms! Some AI video creators spend more than 30,000 yuan a month

November 1 news: According to media reports, during this year's "Double 11" e-commerce promotion, Tokens were listed as an independent category on multiple e-commerce platforms. It is understood that since Tmall launched its Token recharge center on September 3, it has so far connected manufacturers including DeepSeek, Alibaba Cloud, Zhipu and Kimi; at the same time, MiniMax opened its first official brand flagship store, and Qwen Office, StepFun and others have all settled in.

This Double 11, major model manufacturers launched Token discount packages. Take the Qwen AI Lite monthly card as an example: the official website price is 60 yuan, and the promotional price is 39 yuan, more than 30% cheaper. For ordinary consumers, there are mainly two ways to buy Tokens: first, buy pay-as-you-go recharge vouchers, similar to phone credit, buying again when used up; second, subscribe to a fixed quota on a monthly or annual basis. But there are also inconveniences, mainly with fixed quotas: buy too much and you cannot use it all, buy too little and it is not enough.

An enterprise employee in Beijing engaged in AI video production said he spends 30,000 to 40,000 yuan a month on Tokens. Although Tokens are listed on e-commerce platforms, he is still accustomed to buying them through official channels and tool integration platforms. He said: "The monthly, quarterly and annual cards sold on e-commerce platforms are fixed quotas, but according to the pace of work, we prefer to buy as we use."

Some consumers also hope to buy Tokens the way they buy data plans. In response, Ding Ding, deputy general manager of China Unicom Data Intelligence Co., Ltd., said that at present it is difficult to simply apply the logic of buying data plans to Tokens. In the data plan business, the larger the user scale, the thinner the marginal cost is spread, and the more significant the scale effect. (Kuai Technology)

Sohu's Zhang Chaoyang: Short dramas will not completely erode demand for long dramas

November 1 news: Sohu founder, chairman of the board and chief executive officer Zhang Chaoyang said in an interview with the media that short dramas will not completely erode the demand for watching long dramas; many people still watch long dramas, and these are two different needs.

Zhang Chaoyang said that to kill time in fragmented time, one can watch short dramas; but as an appreciation of a work of art and a good story, one should still watch long dramas or movies. In his view, domestic long-video websites face great economic pressure, and the reasons they do not make money are manifold, not because of short dramas.

It is reported that in August this year, Zhang Chaoyang talked about content practitioners' AI anxiety and responded with a metaphor: "What AI produces now gives media and content a plastic feeling. It is like tomatoes forced with chemical fertilizer: they look glossy, but taste of nothing; carrots with a bit of mud do not look so good, but they are delicious and flavorful." (IT Home)

Xpeng Group President Wang Fengying: Starting in 2027, some cities will set up independent MONA stores

On November 1, according to media reports, Xpeng Group President Wang Fengying said during the 2026 Paris Motor Show that starting in 2027, some cities will set up independent MONA stores. She also mentioned that in the future "the possibility of the MONA brand becoming independent is not ruled out."

The report noted that moves have already appeared at the front-line channel level. A salesperson at an Xpeng Motors store in Beijing told the media, "Xpeng and MONA will likely be sold separately, and MONA will have independent stores." He Lei, CEO of Xinchuxing, said that a shopping mall in Haizhu District, Guangzhou, has already seen a "Xpeng MONA Sales Center" awaiting opening.

In addition, Xpeng's internal product strategy is also being adjusted. Xpeng recently merged its four product lines F, D, I, and G into two product lines, G and D, with I and F merged into the G product line, while MONA continues to exclusively hold the D product line. This adjustment further separates MONA's product planning from that of the Xpeng main brand. The Xpeng MONA L05 went on sale on the evening of October 29, with an official guide price starting at 144,800 yuan and a limited-time first-sale price starting at 139,800 yuan. (IT Home) International News

OpenAI announces: Some ChatGPT tasks and Codex will share quota, effective from December

On November 1, OpenAI issued an announcement announcing that it will adjust the usage quota rules for ChatGPT and Codex in December this year. Under the new rules, the usage quotas of the three paid plans ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Business will be calculated together; ChatGPT and Codex will no longer calculate quotas separately but will share the same quota pool.

This adjustment is related to OpenAI integrating ChatGPT Work's agent capabilities into ChatGPT, aiming to enable users to complete more complex tasks directly in ChatGPT. After the adjustment, quota consumption for ChatGPT and Codex will be uniformly calculated by Token, with the specific consumption depending on the model selected by the user and the complexity of the task. Generally speaking, using more capable models and handling more complex tasks will consume more quota.

It is worth noting that OpenAI clearly stated that Instant instant chat will not consume the shared quota, so users' daily use of Instant mode for chatting will not take up this part of the quota. For paid users who use both ChatGPT and Codex, the quotas of the two services will affect each other; if one consumes more, the remaining quota available for the other will decrease accordingly. However, OpenAI emphasized that it is making full preparations for this adjustment to minimize the impact on users' existing usage habits. (Kuai Technology)

On November 1, according to media reports, Anthropic has submitted an application for listing and plans to go public in November, potentially setting a record for the largest IPO in history. The company currently holds more than $112 billion in cash and cash equivalents, and investors expect its IPO may raise about another $100 billion.

In its prospectus, Anthropic outlined a bold plan: from now until 2045, spending on computing infrastructure will exceed $800 billion. Obtaining an investment-grade credit rating is key to achieving the goal, which would allow Anthropic to borrow at lower interest rates to finance its artificial intelligence infrastructure projects.

But Blackstone Group expects that after its IPO, Anthropic will receive a rating in the higher tier of junk grade from major credit rating agencies. This rating will limit the range of funds Anthropic can access, because many insurance companies and pension funds are subject to investment restrictions and cannot hold large amounts of debt from junk-grade borrowers. (Yicai)

Apple iPhone 18 Pro series sales exceed 6 million units

On November 1, according to a tip from digital blogger @RD Observation, who has long tracked the domestic mobile phone market share, as of the 43rd week of 2026 (October 19 to October 25), sales of Apple's iPhone 18 Pro series phones exceeded 6 million units, at about 6.02 million units.

The blogger previously disclosed that as of the 42nd week of 2026 (October 12 to October 18), sales of the iPhone 18 Pro series were about 4.9604 million units. From this it can be calculated that the series' single-week increase was about 1.0596 million units.

According to previous reports, at Apple's 2026 fall launch event on September 10, the iPhone 18 Pro series was officially released, including the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, with starting prices of 9,999 yuan and 10,999 yuan respectively. The iPhone 18 Pro series debuts with the 2-nanometer process A20 Pro chip, whose packaging method draws on the M series chips, with performance and energy efficiency both reaching new highs for iPhone. Both models are equipped with a smaller Dynamic Island, and the all-new 48-megapixel Fusion main camera features a variable aperture. (IT Home)

France plans to approve a traffic tax on internet giants! 0.055 euros per GB of content

On November 1, according to media reports, France has now approved a proposed tax aimed at taxing each GB of internet data sent to French users, with major companies such as Google, Netflix, TikTok, and Meta currently being targeted. Under the proposal, content providers may need to pay the French government 0.055 euros (about 0.41 yuan) for each 1GB of content distributed. Proposer Laurent Lhardit said that France has about 154 million internet users, and the number is still growing, and the tax could generate about 10 billion euros in annual revenue for the government (about 74.4 billion yuan).

The proposal still needs to undergo further parliamentary review, with the goal of taxing companies that generate large amounts of internet traffic, rather than their advertising revenue, profits, and subscriptions. Its explanation specifically mentions Google, Meta, Netflix, Amazon, and content delivery network Akamai as major potential contributors. About 200 billion GB of data passes through French internet service providers each year, and about five major companies in the amendment account for half of that traffic.

Lhardit believes the tax mainly affects global tech companies, because these companies generate most of the data traffic flowing to French users. He also rebutted the claim that the tax increase will ultimately be borne by users: "Some people keep insisting that the tax will be passed on to consumers. However, I cannot understand how the tax can be passed on to users of Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok, because these services are free." (Kuai Technology)

On November 1, Hyundai Motor Group said recently that it plans to establish two special purpose companies (SPCs) in November aimed at developing artificial intelligence (AI) data centers; this move is part of its strategy to expand into the AI infrastructure sector.

Hyundai Motor Group said that its affiliated companies—including Hyundai Motor, Kia, Hyundai Mobis, Hyundai Engineering & Construction, and Hyundai AutoEver—will participate in this investment. One of the special purpose companies (SPC) will be responsible for data center construction and infrastructure development, while the other will be responsible for graphics processing unit (GPU)-related services.

The group said it plans to break ground on the project in March 2027 in the Saemangeum reclamation area in Gunsan, about 200 kilometers southwest of Seoul. The project aims to begin commercial operations in early 2030. (Sina Finance)