9:01 AM | Trump resumes the death penalty; A coffee shop is sentenced to pay 400,000 yuan for filling it with Ultraman-related products; Jiyue has fully started the second batch of refund work.

Listing in Progress

Kayu

It is reported that sources said Kayu plans to raise about $500 million in an IPO in Hong Kong. (Caixin)

Mixue Group

36Kr learned that Mixue Group announced that the company plans to globally offer 17,059,900 H shares, including 1,706,000 shares for sale in Hong Kong, China, and 15,353,900 shares for international sale, with an additional 15% over-allotment option; The offering period is from February 21 to February 26, 2025; The offering price will be HK$202.50 per share, with a trading unit of 100 shares. BofA Securities, Goldman Sachs, and UBS are the joint sponsors; It is expected that the shares will begin trading on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on March 3, 2025.

Top 3 Big News

Trump Terminates All Affirmative Action Policies within the US Federal Government and Resumes the Death Penalty

On the 20th local time, the reporter of the main station learned that Stephen Miller, the assistant to the US president, said that President Trump terminated all Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies within the federal government, fired all federal workers involved in promulgating these policies, and also resumed the death penalty. (CCTV News)

The Coffee Shop Filled with Ultraman Merchandise Was Ordered to Pay 400,000 Yuan in Compensation

In the past two years, a store called "Ultraman Theme Parent-Child Coffee Shop" in Suzhou has attracted many customers. The interior decoration of the store contains a large number of Ultraman-themed figurines, posters, etc., and the drinks and cakes are also named after Ultraman elements. Because it did not obtain authorization, it was sued by the licensee of the Ultraman series of artistic images and element intellectual property rights, demanding to stop copyright infringement and unfair competition, and to compensate 1 million yuan for reasonable expenses and economic losses. Recently, the Huqiu District People's Court of Suzhou City made a judgment on this case, ordering the coffee shop to compensate the plaintiff 400,000 yuan, and the judgment has now come into effect.

The judge introduced that classic IP images such as Ultraman belong to artworks in the sense of the Copyright Law. When operators conduct business operations, reproducing classic images on tangible material carriers or providing them to the public through the Internet, etc., are all acts controlled by exclusive rights and must obtain the authorization and license of the copyright owner in advance. In addition, the extensive use of classic IP elements in the store's operation process not only constitutes copyright infringement but may also be identified as unfair competition due to attaching to the business reputation and causing public confusion. (Yangtze Evening News)

The refund work for the deposit of the second batch of Jiyue users has been fully launched, and the refund agreements have been successfully sent to 83 people.

According to Jiemian News, on February 21, Jiyue announced the progress of the refund of the users' deposit. The refund work for the second batch has been fully launched. As of February 21, the refund agreements have been successfully sent to 83 people, 64 people have completed the signing of the agreements, and 41 people have completed the refund.

According to JRJ.com.cn, on February 17, Jiyue Automobile, which is jointly owned by Geely Holding and Baidu, announced that as of the 13th, the refund work for the deposit of the first batch of users has been completed. Among them, 63 people have successfully received the refund, 4 people are waiting for payment due to incorrect information, and 3 people have not answered the phone after more than 3 calls.

After Jiyue's "dissolution" previously, on December 13, 2024, Baidu, Geely, and Jiyue issued a joint statement stating that as shareholders, Baidu and Geely will, with a highly responsible attitude, actively assist the management of Jidu to properly handle relevant matters, including resolving the social insurance payment for employees and the aftermath of resigned employees as soon as possible; maintaining the normal use, aftermath, and maintenance of users' vehicles, and promoting the reasonable and legal resolution of other matters. (Jiemian News, JRJ.com.cn)

Big Companies / Major Events

An investigation claims that food delivery riders are reluctant to contribute to social security, worrying that they might not be able to receive benefits due to their high mobility.

Recently, JD.com, Meituan, and Ele.me have successively announced that they will contribute to social security for some food delivery riders. Since then, the issue of social security contributions for riders (namely, urban employee social insurance), which has been controversial for many years, has finally seen a breakthrough. On February 20, the resistance of some riders to contribute to social security has attracted attention. An investigation has found that a large number of food delivery riders do not have a strong demand for social security contributions, and the "demand for social security contributions" ranks after the two options of "income" and "job autonomy".

Factors affecting the enthusiasm of riders to contribute to social security: ① The self-paid portion of social security contributions will affect the income of riders; ② If riders want to receive the basic employee pension on a monthly basis after retirement, the duration of social security contributions needs to be at least 15 years. However, the characteristics of flexible employment determine that it is difficult for riders to work on one platform for a long time, and the subsequent employers may not continue to contribute to their social security; ③ The degree of social security coordination will affect the enthusiasm of riders to contribute to social security. Due to the high mobility of riders, they may face many troubles when transferring social security. (Dahe Daily)

Elon Musk Holds Electric Saw and Vows to Cut Down Bureaucracy

The 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was held in the United States from the 19th to the 22nd. On the last day, US President Donald Trump, Argentine President Milei, and other conservative figures attended the conference. However, the most eye-catching was Elon Musk, who played a "Saw" style act, holding an electric saw given by Milei, claiming to combat bureaucracy and waste in the US government. He revealed that the "Government Efficiency Reform Team" led by him is comprehensively reviewing federal agencies. He straightforwardly said, "Government waste is more serious than the public imagines," emphasizing the need to reshape the administrative system through the management thinking of entrepreneurs. (Yangtze Evening News)

DeepSeek Rates Zhuhai as the Most Livable City in China

Recently, a netizen shared that after letting DeepSeek reason one hundred million times, the most livable city in China was given, along with the district of this city, and only one city could be selected. Xiangzhou District in Zhuhai City has achieved the best balance between "natural ecological protection" and "modern urban development". Its comprehensive score in dimensions such as climate, environment, economy, and social governance has a stability of over 99.7% in one hundred million Monte Carlo simulations, far exceeding the standard deviation of other cities. (Sina AI)

Insiders Respond to the Adjustment of ByteDance's Large Model Team Structure

Regarding the team adjustment issue triggered after Wu Yonghui, the former vice president of Google DeepMind, joined ByteDance, insiders responded that Dr. Wu Yonghui is mainly responsible for the exploration of AI basic research, focusing on basic research; Zhu Wenjia, the head of the AI business, is mainly responsible for the work related to model applications, focusing on model applications. Currently, both of them are in the Seed department and report to ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo. As for the fact that after Wu Yonghui joined, some AI teams that originally reported to Zhu Wenjia now report to Wu Yonghui, and the specific job changes of Zhu Wenjia, as of the time of publication, ByteDance has not responded yet. (China Business News)

Poland Releases World's First Bipedal Musculoskeletal Robot: Moves Hands and Feet Like a Human, Netizens Exclaim "Creepy"

On February 19, Clone Robotics, a Polish company, released the bipedal musculoskeletal robot protoclone V1. This is a faceless, anatomically highly accurate synthetic humanoid robot with more than 200 degrees of freedom, more than 1,000 muscle fibers, and 500 sensors. Its design aims to imitate the human bone and muscle structure to achieve more natural and flexible movement. The company claims that this is the world's first bipedal musculoskeletal robot. After the video was released, some netizens exclaimed that it was terrifying, describing the robot as "Westworld" coming to reality. (The Beijing News)

Illustrative Picture

Has the scale of Magic Square Quantitative Investment dropped sharply to 20 billion yuan? Insiders of the company: Untrue news

A picture stating that "the scale of Magic Square Quantitative Investment has shrunk to more than 10 billion yuan" is circulating in the market, and some media reports claim that the current scale is more than 20 billion yuan. In response, several relevant personnel of Magic Square Quantitative Investment have stated that these are untrue. Regarding the specific scale of Magic Square Quantitative Investment, the relevant personnel of the company stated that it is not convenient to respond. According to the statistics of the public account "Quantitative Investment and Machine Learning", as of the end of last year, the management scale of Magic Square Quantitative Investment is in the first echelon, with a scale of more than 50 billion yuan. The statistical data of this public account is highly recognized in the industry. (The Paper)

Nissan-Honda Merger Talks Fail, Japanese Executives Urge Tesla to Invest in Nissan

It is reported that after the merger talks between Japanese automaker Nissan and its rival Honda broke down, a high-level group involving a former Japanese prime minister has formulated a plan for Elon Musk's Tesla to invest in the struggling Nissan. According to three people familiar with the matter, this new proposal led by former Tesla board member Hiroto Mizuno has received support from former Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and his former aide Hiroto Izumi. Several board members of Nissan are also aware of this move. The group hopes that Tesla can become a strategic investor in Nissan because they believe that as the world's largest pure electric vehicle manufacturer, Tesla is eager to acquire Nissan's factories in the United States. (Cailian Press)

Lao Pu Gold Announces That Multiple Stores Will Adjust Prices on February 25 and Implement Purchase Limits Before the Price Adjustment

The Lao Pu Gold Store in Yuyuan, Shanghai, and the Beijing SKP Store have issued an announcement stating that Lao Pu Gold will adjust the prices of its products on February 25, 2025. However, the relevant announcement did not disclose the details of the price adjustment, stating that "The specific details of the price adjustment are subject to the actual marked prices in the online and offline stores." The relevant announcement also mentioned that the relevant stores will impose purchase limits on some products before the price adjustment, with restrictions on the total amount of shopping, jewelry products, and the purchase quantity of the same style products. (Jiemian News)

The First Scientific Research Test Flight of China's Self-developed AS700D Manned Airship, Which Can Be Widely Applied in Low-altitude Tourism, Aerial Advertising, etc.

According to CCTV News, recently, the electrically-powered manned airship AS700D independently developed by China completed its first scientific research flight test in Hubei, marking a major breakthrough in the new green aviation equipment in China's low-altitude economy field.

The AS700D is an all-electric-powered airship independently developed by China, with a maximum designed flight speed of 80 kilometers per hour, a maximum flight altitude of 3,100 meters, and a maximum passenger capacity of 10 people including the pilot. It adopts an advanced lithium battery electric drive system, propeller system, thrust vector system and cooling system. After the AS700D is put into market operation, it can be widely applied in various scenarios such as low-altitude tourism, aerial advertising, urban security, aviation exploration, emergency rescue, etc. (CCTV News)

The Department of Government Efficiency of the United States has reduced nearly half of the staff in the department responsible for supervising the safety of autonomous vehicles

It is reported that the Department of Government Efficiency led by Elon Musk has laid off three of the approximately seven people in the department of the US automotive safety agency responsible for supervising the safety of autonomous vehicles. Employees who were fired by the agency led by the Tesla CEO said they do not think they were targeted because of inspecting driverless vehicles. It is reported that the layoffs in the autonomous vehicle safety unit are part of the layoffs at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is reducing about 10% of its employees through layoffs and buyouts. (Sina Finance)

Elon Musk Says He Is Considering Auditing the Federal Reserve

Elon Musk said on February 20 local time that he is considering auditing the Federal Reserve. Previously, he had called for strengthening the review of the central bank. Since Trump began his second presidential term, the cost-cutting plan proposed by Musk in the Government Efficiency Department has swept through all US federal agencies. (Jiemian News)

SAIC and Huawei Sign Deep Cooperation Agreement in Shanghai

It is learned from SAIC that SAIC Motor Corporation Limited and Huawei Device Co., Ltd. have signed a deep cooperation agreement in Shanghai. The two sides will carry out strategic cooperation in product definition, production and manufacturing, supply chain management, sales and service, etc., to create a new new energy intelligent vehicle. (Shanghai Observer News)

Apple CEO Cook Reportedly Attends White House Meeting

It is reported that Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, arrived at the White House on the 20th local time and attended a meeting in the Oval Office. (Jiemian News)

Tencent Video's Wang Juan: Allocate 10%-20% of the drama budget to the development of horizontal-screen short dramas

At the first China TV Drama Production Industry Conference, Wang Juan, Vice President of Tencent Online Video, stated that Tencent Video will allocate 10%-20% of the drama budget to the development of horizontal-screen short dramas. "We will further be precise and market-oriented in the drama budget. In the past project investment and development, 10%-20% of the budget proportion was inefficient input. We will resolutely optimize this part and reduce the investment in inefficient works. The optimized budget will be transferred to the development of horizontal-screen short dramas. At the same time, we will actively layout vertical-screen micro short dramas, deeply cultivate the experimental fields of high-quality horizontal and vertical-screen short dramas, in order to consolidate our leading advantage in this field in the past two years," she said. (21 Finance and Economics)

Boeing Appoints Head of Government Affairs, Global Public Policy and Corporate Strategy

Boeing announced on February 20 local time that Jeff Shockey is the company's new Executive Vice President of Government Affairs, Global Public Policy and Corporate Strategy, effective February 24. Shockey will report to Boeing President and CEO Kelly Ortberg and serve as a member of the company's Executive Committee. (Jiemian News)

Gucci Responds to Closing Two Stores in One Day: Future Adjustments Will Be Made Dynamically

The luxury brand "Gucci" announced the closure of two stores in Shanghai within one day, which has attracted great market attention. On February 17, Gucci officially closed two stores located in Réel Department Store in Shanghai and Shanghai New World Daimaru Department Store. Up to now, the brand still has 7 stores operating normally in Shanghai. Regarding whether the closure of the two stores in Shanghai is due to store upgrades or other reasons, and whether there will be more store closures in the future, Gucci responded that Gucci has always regarded the Chinese market as an important part of its global strategy. Currently, Gucci is comprehensively promoting its global enhancement strategy, "therefore, dynamic adjustments are being made to the stores in the strategically significant Chinese market. This includes continuing to improve the store network and continuously renovating or expanding key stores". (Everyday Economic Network)

The Forefront of AI

DeepSeek Achieves Over 100 Million Downloads in One Month

The latest data obtained from the data analysis platform QuestMobile shows that as of February 9 since its launch, the cumulative download volume of the DeepSeek App has exceeded 110 million times, and the weekly active user scale has reached a maximum of nearly 97 million. More importantly, DeepSeek has hardly invested in marketing. Under the strong momentum of DeepSeek, Kimi and Doubao, who once stood out, seem to be becoming "supporting roles". It is estimated that Kimi has invested as much as 900 million yuan in user acquisition in the past year, but the user growth effect is not good. (National Business Daily)

DeepSeek will gradually open source 5 code repositories starting next week, unlocking new content daily

36Kr learned that DeepSeek announced that it will gradually open source 5 code repositories starting next week, with new content unlocked every day to further share new progress. DeepSeek introduced that the modules of the current online service have been tested and deployed completely and can be put into the production environment. The company defines itself as a small company and states that every sharing will become a powerful potential energy to accelerate the journey of industry development. DeepSeek also claims that in this field, there is no lofty ivory tower, only the pure garage entrepreneurship spirit and the innovative power built together with the community.

OpenAI Launches AI Agent Tool Operator in Several Regions

On February 21, OpenAI announced that its AI agent tool Operator is now available to Pro users in Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, the United Kingdom, and most regions where ChatGPT is covered. OpenAI stated that it is still working to make Operator available in the European Union, Switzerland, Norway, Liechtenstein, and Iceland. (Jiemian News)

It is reported that OpenAI GPT-4.5 is expected to be released as soon as next week, and GPT-5 may be released in late May.

It is understood that Microsoft is preparing for OpenAI's latest model. It is expected that GPT-4.5 is expected to be released as soon as next week, and Microsoft expects that GPT-5 is expected to be released in late May. The updated GPT-5 will make significant improvements to the way ChatGPT is used, unifying OpenAI's o series and GPT series models, reducing users' confusion in choosing models. (Cailian Press)

OpenAI Has Over 400 Million Weekly Active Users

A spokesperson for ChatGPT developer OpenAI said on February 20 that the company's weekly active users soared to more than 400 million in February, highlighting the rapid growth of the application of artificial intelligence tools. (Sina Finance)

Investment and Financing

"Dingran Technology" Completed Strategic Financing with Ant Group's Participation

36Kr learned that "Dingran Technology" announced the successful completion of strategic financing with the participation of Ant Group, and Gaojie Capital served as the exclusive financial advisor. The funds raised from this strategic financing will be mainly used for market expansion and product research and development. Dingran Technology plans to increase investment in technology research and development, and continuously optimize its big data models and algorithms to cope with the increasingly complex intelligent driving scenarios and market demands, providing the industry with more efficient, accurate, and reliable big data solutions.

Cool Products

The large folding-screen iPhone of Apple unfolds similarly to an iPad, and it is expected to be launched in the next one or two years.

According to IT Home, on February 21, a blogger revealed that Apple's first large folding-screen phone has a 5.49-inch outer screen, which is somewhat like the Find N but shorter and wider. The 7.74-inch inner screen unfolds like an iPad, and "the ratio of the inner and outer screens is indeed unprecedented". The revelation also stated that Apple's folding phone and folding tablet, based on the current prototyping progress, are expected to be launched in the next one or two years. Digital Chat Station said that the new machine is similar to Google's folding screen, but in fact, it is completely different. "Apple is going to reshape the folding ecosystem".

Previously, there were rumors that Apple has started to accelerate the research and development of its first folding-screen iPhone, and the company has begun to cooperate with ultra-thin glass (UTG) suppliers. In response, Lens Technology said, "Due to the confidentiality agreement, the company is not convenient to respond." (IT Home)

Avita 07 Pro+ Goes on Sale, Starting from 219,900 Yuan

36Kr learned that on February 18, Avita Technology announced the refreshing launch of Avita 07 Pro+. The national suggested retail price of the Avita 07 Pro+ Extended Range Version is 219,900 yuan, and the national suggested retail price of the Avita 07 Pro+ Pure Electric Version is 229,900 yuan. Both are standardly equipped with Huawei Qiankun Intelligent Driving ADS SE. At the same time, for the launch of this Avita 07 Pro+, Avita also introduces car purchase privileges. From now until March 31, 2025, users who place an order can enjoy six limited-time rights and benefits: Pay a deposit of 5,000 yuan to deduct 15,000 yuan from the final payment, a 10,000-yuan limited-time launch subsidy, a 6,000-yuan insurance subsidy, a financial policy of up to 19,800 yuan for a 3-year 0-interest loan, a 4,000-yuan 21-inch wheel upgrade deduction coupon, and a lifetime warranty for the three electric systems for the first owner.

Wuling Zhiguang EV Officially Launched

36Kr has learned that on February 14, the Wuling Zhiguang EV was officially launched. It is understood that the new car has launched two versions: the standard version and the comfort version, with an official guide price of 47,800 yuan to 50,800 yuan. From now on, users can place an order for the Wuling Zhiguang EV through channels such as the Wuling Automobile App and the Wuling Automobile Mini Program, and can enjoy the following discounts: Purchase the car and receive a 3.5kW AC charging pile (excluding installation); Pay 1,000 yuan to deduct 2,000 yuan from the car purchase price; Choose one of the two discounts: the financial interest subsidy gift and the replacement subsidy gift, both of which can enjoy a 1,500 yuan car purchase discount (the two discounts cannot be superimposed); Purchase the car and enjoy a 3,888 yuan red-label new energy exclusive service gift package.

Arranged｜Wang Xinyi