Innovation — 358 insights
Apple iPhone Duo price premiums evaporate in China’s scalper market
Innovation

Apple iPhone Duo price premiums evaporate in China’s scalper market

Scalpers in mainland China are slashing prices on Apple’s newly released iPhone Duo after the US tech giant’s first foldable smartphone drew mixed early consumer reviews over durability and software glitches. In Shenzhen’s Huaqiangbei electronics market, a vendor surnamed Shen on Monday cut the premium on a black iPhone Duo with 1 terabyte of memory – one of the most popular models – by 2,800 yuan (US$420), bringing the asking price down to 24,300 yuan from more than 25,000 yuan when the device...

October 26, 2026
China’s AI race needs data fuel. Can a new state-owned giant deliver?
Innovation

China’s AI race needs data fuel. Can a new state-owned giant deliver?

Beijing is making an ambitious bid to turn China’s vast ocean of data into fuel for artificial intelligence and economic growth with the launch of a centralised national data group, though experts warn its success will depend on tearing down entrenched data-sharing barriers. The venture – established on October 20 as a centrally managed state-owned enterprise headquartered in Xiongan New Area, Hebei province – signals Beijing’s intent to translate its digital trove into competitive...

October 26, 2026
Chinese video AI models beat US rivals in visual quality, but lag on safeguards: HKU study
Innovation

Chinese video AI models beat US rivals in visual quality, but lag on safeguards: HKU study

Chinese AI video-generation models have surpassed leading US rivals in visual quality, but several fall behind in safety precautions, according to researchers at the University of Hong Kong. ByteDance’s Seedance 2.0 Pro took top spot in a ranking of 12 leading artificial intelligence video-generation models, scoring 3.84 out of 5 for visual quality. It outperformed Google DeepMind’s Veo 3.1, which scored 3.47, and OpenAI’s Sora 2 Pro, on 3.27, in a study led by Zhenhui Jack Jiang, professor of...

October 26, 2026
South Korea urged to guard chip profitability as China’s CXMT and YMTC gain market share
Innovation

South Korea urged to guard chip profitability as China’s CXMT and YMTC gain market share

China’s expanding semiconductor industry is fuelling anxiety in South Korea, where a new report from PwC has warned local chipmakers to defend profitability as Chinese rivals scale up production and strengthen market share. Samil PwC, the South Korean member firm of the global consultancy, said in a report made public on Monday that Chinese competition would likely heat up first in the areas of conventional memory, mature-node manufacturing, and packaging and testing. To stay ahead, Samil PwC...

October 26, 2026
Why cloud computing pioneer Wang Jian thinks space is the next AI frontier
Innovation

Why cloud computing pioneer Wang Jian thinks space is the next AI frontier

Long before artificial intelligence became the next big thing in the tech industry, Wang Jian was crafting the foundational infrastructure that would eventually power it. In 2008, he joined Alibaba Group Holding – owner of the South China Morning Post – as chief architect and founded Alibaba Cloud in 2009, convincing the company’s leadership to invest heavily in building a cloud computing infrastructure from scratch. Today, Wang’s purview has expanded considerably. As an academician at the...

October 25, 2026
China’s tech giants are paying 1 million yuan for a new kind of AI engineer
Innovation

China’s tech giants are paying 1 million yuan for a new kind of AI engineer

Chinese technology giants are dangling annual pay packages approaching 1 million yuan (US$149,739) to attract artificial intelligence engineers who can turn AI models into commercial applications. Companies including ByteDance, Tencent Holdings and Alibaba Group Holding are stepping up recruitment and training of the so-called forward-deployed engineers (FDEs), who work directly with customers to develop and integrate AI applications into business operations. Demand for such professionals has...

October 25, 2026
Nvidia’s Jensen Huang brings ‘sovereign AI’ push to Kazakhstan, shrugs off bubble fears
Innovation

Nvidia’s Jensen Huang brings ‘sovereign AI’ push to Kazakhstan, shrugs off bubble fears

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is pitching the concept of “sovereign AI” in Kazakhstan – part of his global crusade urging nations to build domestic computing infrastructure using the firm’s chips – as the energy-rich nation emerges as a US-China battleground for artificial intelligence. Speaking at a fireside chat in Astana on Friday with Kazakh AI and digital development minister Zhaslan Madiyev, Huang said AI was reshaping every industry in a transformation that “affects every single person and...

October 23, 2026
DeepSeek, MiniMax secure open-source licences days after new China export rules: state media
Innovation

DeepSeek, MiniMax secure open-source licences days after new China export rules: state media

Chinese artificial intelligence model developers DeepSeek and MiniMax have completed export registration procedures and proceeded with open-source releases and overseas licensing activities, according to Chinese state media, days after Beijing moved to tighten oversight on AI tech transfers. Yuyuan Tantian, an influential social media account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV, reported on Thursday evening that the two AI companies had completed the required registrations after Beijing...

October 23, 2026
Unitree developing AI system to let humanoid robots improve themselves
Innovation

Unitree developing AI system to let humanoid robots improve themselves

Unitree Robotics is developing a “self-evolving” feedback loop designed to allow humanoid robots to write code, run simulations and improve their real-world performance independently, founder Wang Xingxing said, in a move that mirrors a broader push towards “self-improving” artificial intelligence. Speaking on Thursday at a physical AI conference hosted by Unitree in Hangzhou, Wang unveiled the project, dubbed “Unitree Rehearsal”, which he called the company’s most important initiative of the...

October 22, 2026
Websites pulled offline worldwide as AI finds critical security flaws
Innovation

Websites pulled offline worldwide as AI finds critical security flaws

Government agencies and companies around the world shut down websites Wednesday after two critical flaws came to light involving PHP, a programming language that is the basis for a large share of the internet. PHP sits underneath popular web design platforms, so the weaknesses potentially affect a vast range of websites, from online stores and news outlets to government services. Wiz, one of the security firms that found the flaws, estimated that PHP runs about 70 per cent of the world’s...

October 21, 2026
Meta to pay New Mexico a historic US$25 billion in Cambridge Analytica Facebook case
Innovation

Meta to pay New Mexico a historic US$25 billion in Cambridge Analytica Facebook case

Meta Platforms was ordered to pay a groundbreaking US$25 billion civil penalty to the state of New Mexico in a consumer deception case spurred by the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The fine issued by state court Judge Francis Mathew is among the largest verdicts issued in US legal history. The award comes after a jury in Santa Fe determined that Meta had violated the state’s consumer protection over 43 million times based on widely viewed deceptive statements made by the company and its top...

October 21, 2026
Nvidia CEO to deliver keynote speech in Berlin as his firm faces investor scrutiny over AI
Innovation

Nvidia CEO to deliver keynote speech in Berlin as his firm faces investor scrutiny over AI

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is set to take the stage in Berlin on Wednesday, as the world’s most valuable company faces heightened investor scrutiny over whether the massive artificial intelligence spending boom – the engine behind the chipmaker’s meteoric growth – can deliver long-term returns. The conference agenda focuses on sovereign AI, industrial automation and operational infrastructure – key sectors where Nvidia hopes to drive demand beyond the handful of US tech giants currently dominating...

October 21, 2026