The People's Bank of China and the State Administration of Financial Supervision and Administration announced on May 17 that in order to implement the decisions and arrangements of the Party Central Committee and the State Council, adapt to the new changes in the supply and demand relationship of the mainland real estate market, the new expectations of the people for high-quality housing, and promote the stable and healthy development of the real estate market, the relevant matters of the personal housing loan policy are hereby notified as follows:
For households that take out loans to purchase commercial housing, the minimum down payment ratio for commercial personal housing loans for the first house is adjusted to not less than 15%, and the minimum down payment ratio for commercial personal housing loans for second houses is adjusted to not less than 25%. On this basis, the provincial-level branches of the People's Bank of China and the dispatched agencies of the State Financial Supervision and Administration independently determine the lower limit of the minimum down payment ratio for commercial personal housing loans for the first and second houses in each city under their jurisdiction in accordance with the requirements of urban regulation and control and in accordance with the principle of city-specific policies. (CCTV News)
On May 17, it was reported that Human Horizons, the parent company of Gaohe Automobile, issued an internal announcement on the working group during the company's reorganization, and decided to establish a restructuring working group and a joint operation working group. The restructuring team will be responsible for the restructuring of all operations-related activities, from equity to all operations, and will consist of four groups: shareholder affairs, government, suppliers and employees. The joint operation working group is responsible for the company's daily decision-making and operation, and consists of seven teams: product planning, project design engineering, production and supply chain, marketing, finance, legal affairs, human resources and comprehensive functions.
On the same day, media reported that Human Horizons and iAuto Group Inc. officially signed a comprehensive strategic cooperation agreement on May 16, local time in the United States. iAuto plans to invest more than US$1 billion in the first round of special funds to support the restructuring of Human Horizons Gaohe Auto. (Interface News)
[Declaring war on YouTube? TikTok tests 60-minute long videos] Short-form video platform TikTok is quietly testing a new feature that allows users to upload videos up to 60 minutes long. This feature is currently only available to a small number of users in some regions, and TikTok has also said that it has no plans to fully roll it out. The test of this feature marks TikTok's official foray into the long-form video space. The platform initially took the world by storm with its 15-second short videos, but in recent years it has continued to relax its time limit. While consolidating the advantages of short videos, TikTok is also deliberately testing the waters of long videos, intending to compete head-on with YouTube, another major video platform. (Sina Finance)
[Tencent Video Customer Service Responds to the Resale of the Drama "Celebrating More Than Years 2"] On May 16, the drama "Celebrating More Than Years 2" returned after five years, causing heated discussions on the whole network. On the second-hand e-commerce platform, there are many sellers selling drama resources, with prices as low as 1 yuan, and promise to "automatically send them in seconds, update them as soon as they go online, and update the package to the end". In this regard, Tencent video customer service responded: There is no cooperative relationship with the merchant, it is recommended to look for official channels, do not believe in low-cost members, or say that you can continue to watch the latest version of the plot and other services, these are all account security risks or shopping risks, don't believe the merchant's words. (Tencent.com)
[LeTV will invest in Burger King? Burger King (China) Response] Regarding the recent news that LETV will cooperate with Burger King, on May 17, the relevant person in charge of Burger King (China) responded that up to now, Burger King (China) Investment Co., Ltd. has not had a direct cooperative relationship with LETV and its subsidiaries. According to LeTV's announcement, its second-level wholly-owned subsidiary will sign a financial assistance agreement with Beijing Wangdao Burger Co., Ltd. Beijing King's Road Burger Co., Ltd. is one of Burger King's multi-store franchisees, operating a number of Burger King restaurants in Tianjin, Jinan, Nanning, Haikou and other cities since 2023. (The Paper)
According to the American magazine "WIRED", the OpenAI team focused on studying the existential danger of artificial intelligence has all resigned or been absorbed by other groups. OpenAI announced a new research team last July in preparation for the emergence of a super AI capable of outwitting its creators, with Ilya Sutskever, one of the company's founders, appointed as co-leader of the team. The dissolution of the team is yet another evidence of the recent turmoil within the company. Two of the team's researchers were fired for leaking company secrets, and another member left in February, The Information reported last month. OpenAI's charter states that artificial general intelligence, i.e., technology that can match or surpass humans, must be safely developed. The company recently released a new model for GPT-4o, and there is no indication that the recent departure is related to the company's AI efforts, but the latest developments do raise questions about privacy, emotional manipulation, and cybersecurity risks. (Finance)
Sony Music warns AI companies to stop using its content to train models: Sony Music Group, one of the world's largest record labels, has warned AI companies and music streaming platforms not to use the company's content to train models without explicit permission. Sony Music sent letters to more than 700 companies trying to protect its intellectual property, including album art, metadata, musical compositions, and lyrics, from being used to train AI models. (Finance Associated Press)
X.com On May 17, Beijing time, Musk announced that the social platform X (formerly Twitter) had launched a new domain name X.com. Musk wrote on the social platform X: "The entire core system is now running on X.com. (Interface News)
[Indian minister says 25% of iPhones will be produced in India by 2028] Rajeev Chandrasekhar, India's Minister of State for Electronics and IT, said that Apple is planning to expand its production in India, and it is expected that by 2028, 25% of iPhones will be produced in India. At present, Apple has begun to build a local supply chain in India, and its main production partners Foxconn and Tata Electronics will also expand their manufacturing capacity in India. Foxconn, the world's largest OEM manufacturer, and Apple's largest OEM partner, has the lion's share of iPhones made in India. At the beginning of 2023, India was responsible for only 5 to 7 percent of apple manufacturing, but by the end of the year, that proportion had grown to 14 percent. Currently, iPhone 12, 13, 14, and 15 models have been produced in India. (Fast Technology)
On May 17, Chery Xingtu Automobile issued a statement on the paint complaints of Xingtu Yaoguang users. Xingtu Automobile said that the main reason for this phenomenon has been identified: the inner panel of the Yaoguang door is made of zinc-magnesium-aluminum, which has high requirements for the paint spraying process, and in the process of implementing the process, there may be a phenomenon that is not in place, resulting in local wrinkles in the paint at the edge of the inner panel of some doors. According to the analysis of the company's experts, this phenomenon does not affect any function of the vehicle. The team of experts has until May 15 to improve the coating process of the relevant parts to ensure that the products produced from now on will not be similar to the same phenomenon. Xingtu Auto promises to provide a lifetime warranty service for this phenomenon. (Global Network Technology)
Chinese On May 17, Jiang Jie, vice president of Tencent Group, said at the Tencent Cloud Generative AI Industry Application Summit that Tencent's hybrid model has ranked first in China in terms of overall performance through continuous iteration, and some Chinese capabilities have caught up with GPT-4. In response to the high-profile video generation capabilities, Tencent Hybrid supports a variety of video generation capabilities such as Wensheng video, picture video, graphic video, and video raw video, and has supported 16S video generation. At the level of generating 3D, Tencent Hybrid has laid out text/picture generation 3D, and a single image can generate a 3D model in only 30 seconds. Jiang Jie also said that the core Wensheng Wenda model of Hybrid Yuan will be open source in the third quarter of this year. (Sina Finance)
The latest report from Amit Daryanani, an analyst at Wall Street investment bank Evercore ISI, pointed out that Dell has received a large order for Tesla's AI servers, and the backlog of AI orders is expected to continue to pour in, raising Dell's target price from the original $140 to $165. (Straight Flush)
Recently, Beijing Chezhixing Car Rental Co., Ltd. was established, the legal representative is Keyan, with a registered capital of 1 million yuan, and its business scope includes small and micro bus leasing services, car sales, and online taxi booking services. The equity panorama penetration chart shows that the company is wholly owned by Beijing Liding Automobile Sales Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Li Auto. (Finance Associated Press)
On May 17, a video circulating on the Internet showed that a truck transporting cars caught fire on the highway, and a number of Wenjie brand products were burning on the car, and smoke was billowing from the scene. On the same day, Cialis Automobile responded that on May 17, in the process of transporting Cialis commercial vehicles, the logistics company passed through the Hubei Caidian section of the G50 Shanghai-Chongqing Expressway, and a combustion accident occurred, and the preliminary determination was that the truck's brake system was locked and the rear wheel of the truck caught fire, and the loaded goods were damaged after the fire spread. (CBN)
Johnson & Johnson announced that it has reached a definitive agreement with Proteologix to acquire biotechnology company Proteologix for $850 million in cash, and the transaction is expected to close in mid-2024, subject to antitrust reviews and other customary closing conditions. Johnson & Johnson said the acquisition will strengthen the company's dermatology portfolio and have the opportunity to address significant demand in the atopic dermatitis (AD) segment. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
[Japan Life Insurance will spend $3.8 billion to acquire Corebridge shares to enter the U.S. insurance market] Japan Life Insurance said on May 16 that it agreed to spend more than $3.8 billion to acquire a 20% stake in American life insurance company Corebridge Financial from American International Group to enter the U.S. insurance market. The deal is expected to close next year. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
ABB Group announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire Siemens' switch and socket business in China, and the transaction is expected to be completed in the next 12 months. The business acquired by ABB includes switches and sockets, smart home systems, smart door locks and other home automation products, which will continue to use the Siemens brand under a licensed agreement. Upon completion of the acquisition, ABB will gain access to Siemens' distribution network in 230 cities in China. Siemens' switch and socket business achieved more than $150 million in revenue in China in 2023. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
【Yi Yi Technology Completes 10 Million Yuan A Series A Financing】Yi Yi Technology, a green energy overall solution provider, recently completed 10 million yuan A round of financing. The investor in this round of financing is Zhineng Capital. This round of funds is mainly used for the research and development of a new generation of alkaline electrolyzer and composite control technology, the expansion of international and domestic markets and the construction of talent team. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
【Jinmate Completes Over 400 Million Yuan Series B Financing】Jinmate, a provider of intelligent manufacturing overall solutions and digital intelligent equipment, recently completed a Series B financing of over 400 million yuan, led by Yuanjing Capital, followed by Changxing Economic Development, and a large proportion of additional investment from old shareholders such as Oriental Jiafu and Haibang Investment. The funds raised in this round will be mainly used for overseas strategy, technological innovation, team expansion, main business expansion and acquisition of high-quality targets at home and abroad. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
【Liang Baba Completes Series A Financing of 100 Million Yuan】"Liang Baba", an industrial digital platform under Yuanyao Group, announced the completion of a round A financing of more than 100 million yuan. This round of financing was invested by two regional rural revitalization funds managed by Zhaoken Capital, Guizhou Zhongken Fund and Hunan Zhongken Fund, with Zhonghui Consulting as the financial advisor. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
The two sides will jointly promote the development of embodied intelligence represented by general humanoid robots, create robot products with continuous technological innovation, and develop application scenarios that can be commercialized. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
Fano Labs has completed a Series B round of financing, led by Openspace Ventures, with participation from HSBC, Greater Good Investment (the family office of the Lorens and his wife) and existing shareholders. Fano Labs is a language AI company founded in 2015 as a spin-off of the University of Hong Kong that uses AI technology to develop speech recognition (ASR), speaker separation, voiceprint verification, speech synthesis and natural language processing (NLP) technologies for enterprises and public sector organizations. (Smartbeast analysis here to see more)
On May 17, Xpeng Motors said that the G6 electric SUV and X9 seven-seater car will land in Hong Kong in the second half of this year, and the "one for one" intention price of G6 starts at HK$299,900. The car will be equipped with a next-generation voice control system that can recognize Cantonese. (Tencent.com)
[Zhongke Aerospace's "Space Travel Vehicle" will make its first flight in 2027 and start manned space edge tourism in 2028] Zhongke Aerospace announced that its "space travel vehicle" will make its first flight in 2027 and plans to start manned space edge tourism in 2028. The space travel vehicle is a combination of a single-stage rocket and a tourist module equipped with 4 panoramic portholes and can carry 7 passengers per flight. (IT House)
Recently, IDC released a quarterly tracking report on China's tablet market in the first quarter of 2024, which shows that China's tablet market shipments in the first quarter of 2024 were 7.13 million units, a year-on-year increase of 6.6%, of which the consumer market increased by 10.7% year-on-year and the commercial market increased by 6.3% year-on-year. After four consecutive quarters of decline in 2023, China's tablet market demand ushered in a slight rebound, coupled with the pull of shipments at the beginning of the year, market shipments ushered in positive growth in the first quarter of this year. In terms of top manufacturers, Huawei continued to rank first in China's tablet market share with 2.59 million units shipped, and further expanded its lead. (National Business Daily)
[11 films are scheduled to be released in the Dragon Boat Festival in 2024] On May 17, it was reported that "Mad Max: Goddess of Fury" was officially announced to be released nationwide on June 7, according to the Maoyan Professional Edition release calendar, as of now, a total of 11 films are scheduled to be released in the Dragon Boat Festival in 2024, which will be released on June 7: "American Civil War", "Mad Max: Berserk Goddess", "Land of Dreams", "Day and Night River", "Watermelon Team"; Released on June 8: "Sweeping the Dark, Never Give Up", "I Don't Want to Be Friends with You", "Rifle Hotel", "Stop-and-Go", "Negotiator", "Leaving the Injury". (Interface News)
On May 17, data released by Ctrip showed that since the beginning of this year, the number of bookings for domestic tourist museum tickets has increased by 104% year-on-year, reaching almost one out of every ten people who book tickets for scenic spots. In the platform's ranking of popular museums, Jingzhou Museum, Weifang Kite Museum, Qinghai Tibetan Culture Museum, Zigong Salt History Museum and other lesser-known museums are on the list. Among them, the orders of the Qinghai Tibetan Culture Museum increased by 208% year-on-year, and the Weifang Kite Museum increased by more than 6 times year-on-year. (Finance)