00:00First, with Alibaba's just general numbers, how worrying is it that their profitability is being so hit by competition?
00:07It's not that worrying. I think this was very well announced.
00:10They were telling us about the investments in 2025 that were going into AI,
00:14and they've also announced that that's going to double in 2026.
00:16So that probably holds in terms of pressure on income.
00:21Some of the numbers were pretty optimistic, and certainly in terms of the AI announcements
00:25and what they're doing with their token hub, you know, we see pretty good potential.
00:29And again, I think this has been part of a well-announced plan that's in a couple of years of
00:33execution right now
00:34and seems to be relatively on schedule.
00:37Okay, let's talk about what's on schedule when it comes to AI adoption and competing against, say, like a Tencent.
00:42We were just hearing from Yuckelung about why Tencent's higher.
00:45Many people feeling that the WeChat optionality that it gives you,
00:49particularly with open-claw and agentic AI penetration, is just far clearer.
00:53How is Alibaba going to make sure that its AI tech stack works?
00:58Well, I think there's two things.
00:59One, Quen's open-source model is incredible.
01:02I've got it running on my new M5 laptop right now,
01:05and it actually is one of the best models that you can get running locally.
01:08So they've got incredible adoption there.
01:10And you talk about open-claw.
01:11And then again, what are these agents and the agentic AI going to be doing?
01:15They're going to be buying tokens.
01:16So opening up that token hub is great.
01:19And let's not forget, I mean, this was their 10th quarter of triple-digit AI revenue.
01:23So when they're talking about these massive ambitious goals of $100 billion in revenue,
01:28I think there's a real clear path for them to get there.
01:31And another thing that we notice in China as well is they may not be dealing with the top models
01:36or winning the contest there, but the adoption rates among users,
01:40even open-claw, a little later adoption there,
01:43but now is having more uses, installations inside China than the U.S.
01:47So I think all of those adoption rates in China in general with the way the AI market looks like
01:52and the willingness of employers now to spend on tokens to enhance the productivity of their offices,
01:57I think is very positive and should lend to more triple-digit growth throughout 2026.
02:03I mean, Jacob, you've always been this great read on the consumer over in Asia and China in particular.
02:09What's it like on the streets, the sort of fanfare, the hype around open-claw?
02:14Well, it's not just on the streets. It's all over social media.
02:18It's pretty amazing.
02:19And the levels of innovation that are coming out, you know, they're using different models.
02:23It's running so much more locally than the installations did.
02:26But it's basically allowed on-premise to come back to being an option.
02:31They don't need to, you know, have a very tech background to open up, you know, AWS or Alleyone equivalents.
02:38They can actually just go buy older Mac hardware that's readily available on the market
02:43and get some of these systems running up in their apartments or houses or offices.
02:46So that's really allowed it to go from being a – maybe having a very technical background to, you know,
02:51general acceptance among the masses.
02:53And why Mac minis are flying off the shelves, why Raspberry Pi in the U.K. share prices spiraled higher.
02:59Jacob, what, though, of the pushback from a regulatory perspective?
03:02If you own Alibaba, if you own Tencent or any of the Chinese giants, you know about regulatory risk.
03:08Well, we're starting to see regulators and state governments slightly push back against open-claw just running rife in state
03:13-backed businesses.
03:15Well, I would say that that would be the case.
03:17But the government, in terms of where we operate in, you know, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, just outside of Shanghai, there's
03:22been very supportive.
03:23There's even been local government classes, you know, for getting people to set these up.
03:28So we've never seen adoption from the governments like that.
03:32So I don't think that there's – there might be some security with open-claw.
03:37But let's not also forget Moonshot launched Kimmy Claw, too.
03:39So there's going to be alternatives that do roughly the same thing that might be just a little bit more
03:44suited to the Chinese market, too, as well.
03:46A little bit more firewall-compatible as well.
03:49Let's just, therefore, put this all in context, Jacob.
03:52As people are – as the brands that you work with are looking to access an Asian virus, people are
03:56looking to take on the various ways of getting to consumers via chatbots.
04:02How does that landscape look for you right now?
04:05Yeah, well, I think in terms of AI in general, it's made accessing Asia way more easy.
04:10The chatbots are probably not the best way to interact with your customers at that point.
04:14But being able to use, you know, generative – so, you know, you're maybe taking model shots for China and
04:19being able to adjust them for Japan and Korea, not having to do three shoots, for example.
04:22Being able to change your languages, being able to interact with your customers in multiple languages throughout Asia has really
04:28kind of laid economies of scale to being able to get access to the entire region and not looking at
04:33this like, you know, maybe 12 different markets and more looking at it like just a couple.
04:38AI is going to make that easier and easier.
04:40And inventory projections, you know, we're looking at social media now to see, you know, what, you know, might be
04:45selling really well in the summer.
04:46All these things are really helping, you know, brands get access to the market at cheaper, you know, or a
04:52less barrier, a smaller barrier to entry than they were doing pre-AI.
04:57Who else should a potential marketeer be wanting to access Asia, be looking at?
05:03Look, we talked Alibaba, Tencent, but there are plenty of other options.
05:07Well, Q&K is one of the best on-premise models that exists out there too, and that's by Moonshot.
05:13So there's just a ton. I mean, we have an office in Hangzhou too, and there's just AI companies all
05:18around us.
05:18I mean, DeepSeq's not too far from Alibaba.
05:21Douyin's sandwiched in between them, Red Note's in that neighborhood.
05:23So there's just a whole, you know, environment of innovation, very similar to what's been going on in Silicon Valley.
05:29So, you know, we don't know all of the total winners, but the barrier to entry, again, with AI, it's
05:35smaller and smaller.
05:36DeepSeq was launching, you know, their models with only 125 people.
05:39So we would expect a lot more innovation and, you know, it's going to be an exciting year, that's for
05:45sure.
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