LUO Yonghao steps down from core position at Smartisan Software; sources say it's a pre-determined personnel arrangement and he has paid off nearly 1 billion yuan in debts.

Tianyancha shows that recently, there has been a change in the business position of Luo Yonghao, the founder of Smartisan Technology. His position at Smartisan Software (Beijing) Co., Ltd. has changed from "Executive Director" to "Director". This is another instance of Luo Yonghao withdrawing from the core management position of Smartisan-related enterprises in recent years.

Yesterday, an insider from Smartisan Technology revealed to a reporter from NBD that this position adjustment is a regular business change for the enterprise and is part of the company's established personnel arrangement, with no special reason for the change.

The reporter sorted through the public data on Tianyancha and found that Luo Yonghao is still deeply tied to "Smartisan-related" enterprises. Among the 7 related enterprises he is associated with, he holds core executive positions in 5 companies, including the Chairman of Smartisan Technology (Chengdu) Co., Ltd. and the Executive Director of Beijing Smartisan Digital Technology Co., Ltd.

Looking back at the development of Smartisan Technology, from its once glorious days to its dismal exit, its decline is truly regrettable.

In 2014, Smartisan Technology launched its first mobile phone product, the Smartisan T1. This product won the iF Design Gold Award, becoming the first domestic mobile phone to win this award. However, the good times did not last long. From 2015 to 2017, the company continued to incur large losses. Coupled with multiple business problems such as the market sales of multiple products falling short of expectations, the failure of the TNT (Touch and Talk, a large-screen desktop computing device based on Smartisan OS) project investment, and a tight capital chain, in the second half of 2018, Smartisan Technology suffered a serious business crisis and eventually exited the smartphone market. As a result, Luo Yonghao was burdened with a huge debt.

According to what Luo Yonghao previously disclosed in "A Confession of an 'Old Delinquent' CEO", after the crisis at Smartisan Technology broke out, the company owed a total of about 600 million yuan to banks, partners, and suppliers. To save the company, he personally signed an unsecured guarantee of over 100 million yuan. In 2020, Luo Yonghao publicly stated that he had repaid nearly 400 million yuan in debt at that time and expected to settle all the debts within a year. However, during the subsequent debt repayment process, various lawsuit compensations, fines, and new debts in 2022 caused the total debt to rise from 600 million yuan to 1.3 billion yuan. In August 2024, Luo Yonghao published an article disclosing that he had repaid a total of 824 million yuan by then.

Regarding the latest debt repayment progress, the above-mentioned insider revealed to the reporter that currently, Luo Yonghao has repaid nearly 1 billion yuan in debt in total, and the work of clearing the remaining debt is progressing steadily. He himself is also fully committed to work to speed up the implementation of the subsequent repayment plan.

It is worth mentioning that while the debt repayment is progressing steadily, Luo Yonghao has not stopped his entrepreneurial journey.

In 2022, Luo Yonghao chose to delve deeper into the technology sector again. In June of that year, he announced his withdrawal from all social platforms and began a new round of entrepreneurship with dedication. The following month, he officially announced the establishment of "Beijing Red Thread Technology Co., Ltd." in the "Jiaogefriends" live streaming room, officially kicking off a new entrepreneurial journey.

Red Thread Technology had a rapid start in its early days. It completed a $50 million angel round of financing in less than 4 months, with a post-investment valuation of up to $200 million. However, the company's entrepreneurial transformation path is still bumpy. Initially, the company focused on the R & D of AR (Augmented Reality) intelligent products. After the project encountered obstacles, it shifted to the AI (Artificial Intelligence) sector as a whole. However, the core AI hardware product under development has not been launched into the market yet.

At the end of December 2025, at the "Luo Yonghao's Crossroads" sharing conference, Luo Yonghao launched an AI product called "Qieting" in the last ten-odd minutes of the conference.

According to his introduction, this is a voice listening library for in-depth interpretation and analysis of good books in the AI era. The core is to interpret books through AI and present the content in the form of explanations and analyses, supporting audio playback and text reading. Luo Yonghao emphasized that generating the explanation of a single book by AI only requires a single consumption of computing power, and subsequent listening and reading by thousands of users do not require repeated investment, thus realizing the implementation of AI-native applications at a controllable cost. The product also supports functions such as customizing the voice tone.

As of now, Red Thread Technology has only launched two products, the AI assistant software J1 Assistant and the AI audiobook app "Qieting". Neither of these two products has generated much heat in the consumer market or caused a stir in the industry. The company's overall AI commercialization process still faces many challenges.

This article is from the WeChat official account "NBD". Author: Li Yutong, Editors: Cheng Peng, Dong Xingsheng, Du Hengfeng, Proofreader: Zhang Jinhe. Republished by 36Kr with authorization.