March 28, 2021: Global Startups; Xiaomi > Huawei; Next Phase of China’s EVs Market; No-Code

Hello Interconnected Readers:

This weekly issue has a nice balance of news commentary from the rise of international startups as evidenced by the most recent YC batch, to Xiaomi racing ahead of Huawei, to the next phase of China’s EVs market, to the “no-code” movement.

[If you’d like to skip ahead to the six news stories and commentaries from last week – three from English language sources, three from Chinese language sources -- here are this issue’s items:

• “YC goes global” (English Source: Protocol)
• “Move Over Huawei, Xiaomi Is China’s New Smartphone King” (English Source: Wall Street Journal)
• “What’s Up With China EVs? Here’s a Clue” (English Source: Bloomberg)
• “Zhihu successfully went public in the U.S. with a market value of over $5 billion; Alibaba, Tencent and JD subscribed in China's largest online Q&A community” (Chinese Source: iponews)
• “Across the Pacific Ocean, Neil Shen and Feifei Li had a ‘super’ conversation” (Chinese Source: China Venture)
• “Is No-Code Really Here?” (Chinese Source: CSDN)]

Kevin

Before you read on, please check out last week's deep dive post: "Building A Global Company from Day 0 with Clint Smith"

“YC goes global” (English Source: Protocol)

My Thoughts: Y Combinator just concluded yet another batch -- its biggest one yet -- with more non-US based startups than ever before. More than half of all the companies are based outside of the US, representing 41 countries. I have been bullish on the potential of international startups and am glad to see more investors placing bets outside of Silicon Valley. In this interconnected world where startup know-hows are more evenly distributed (YC has done tremendous work on this front), places like India (big representation in this batch), Southeast Asia, Latin America, and of course China will undoubtedly produce some world-changing companies in the next decade.

“Move Over Huawei, Xiaomi Is China’s New Smartphone King” (English Source: Wall Street Journal)

My Thoughts: Huawei’s woe seems to be Xiaomi’s gain. Even though Xiaomi was placed on the Defense Department’s blacklist, it won a federal district court case which temporarily halted any investment ban. Xiaomi is now seeking a permanent halt. One interesting anecdote in this WSJ article worth noting: a young Chinese consumer chose Xiaomi over Huawei, because he knew the chip inside Xiaomi’s phone is foreign-made, thus deemed of better quality, than Huawei’s homegrown chip. Nationalistic support for “Made in China” technology can only go so far, when the technology is perceived to be inferior.

“What’s Up With China EVs? Here’s a Clue” (English Source: Bloomberg)

My Thoughts: A new annual work report from the Chinese government detailed a noteworthy shift in the next phase of the country’s electric vehicles development plan. This Bloomberg report provided a good summary. Instead of focusing solely on making EVs, the new emphasis is on supporting infrastructures -- EV charging stations, battery swapping facilities, and battery recycling. The topic of “lithium-ion battery recycling” appeared for the first time in this report. In pure number terms, China is already the global leader in public charging stations, having installed more than 112,000 of them in last December alone, which is already more than the total number in the US. Clearly, this is just the beginning.

“Zhihu successfully went public in the U.S. with a market value of over $5 billion; Alibaba, Tencent and JD subscribed in China's largest online Q&A community” (Chinese Source: iponews)

My thoughts: Zhihu’s IPO is at least one example of a Chinese tech company doing better than its direct American counterpart -- Quora, in this case. Even though the stock price dropped below the offering price on its first day of trading, grabbing a $5 billion valuation in the public market for a Q&A forum is no easy feat. I read Zhihu threads frequently to learn about technology and engineering. I’ll be watching this listing closely.

“Across the Pacific Ocean, Neil Shen and Feifei Li had a ‘super’ conversation” (Chinese Source: China Venture)

My thoughts: Neil Shen, head of Sequoia China, and Feifei Li, Co-Director of Stanford’s Human-Centered AI Institute (and the first professor endowed by Sequoia Capital), had a fascinating conversation about AI’s impact on healthcare. It’s one of those conversations that probably deserves a translated version in English and many other languages to unlock the insights shared. (If you are interested in a full English version, please let me know.) The discussion touched on many aspects of AI’s application in healthcare that have been accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Some of these examples include diagnosis, patient care using AI-enabled sensors, and R&D of new medicines.

“Is No-Code Really Here?” (Chinese Source: CSDN)

My thoughts: This is one of the few commentaries I’ve seen in the Chinese tech blogosphere on the “no-code” movement. Even though no-code and low-code have been a trendy investment category in Silicon Valley for a few years now, I’ve yet to see a pure no-code startup coming out of China. That will likely change in the next five years, as the time lag in technology trends and know-hows between the US and China become shorter and shorter.

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