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Alibaba founder Jack Ma made his first appearance in months on the Chinese mainland. Photo: VCG
Welcome to Caixin’s Tech Insider, your twice-weekly wrap on the movers, shakers and deal-makers in China’s tech scene.
Meituan’s billionaire co-founder takes another step on his chatbot quest
Meituan co-founder Wang Huiwen’s artificial intelligence (AI) startup will acquire Beijing OneFlow Technology Ltd. to create a Chinese version of ChatGPT, Caixin learned from several people familiar with the matter.
The billionaire, who retired from Meituan in late 2020, declared last month he would create a ChatGPT-like service, announcing a $50 million investment to set up Beijing Lightyear Technology to recruit top AI talent. Fellow Meituan co-founder Wang Xing is also backing the startup, which Wang Huiwen said had a valuation of $200 million.
The acquisition was approved by OneFlow’s board, the sources said. Neither OneFlow nor Lightyear Technology. immediately responded to a request for comment.
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