王若琨 / Ruokun Wang

Right, I moved to Shenzhen at the end of last year Because our portfolio has been growing more and more And after coming to Shenzhen, I could probably manage things better Uh, so we look at AI software on one side And we also look at AI hardware I joined Yuanjin in 2021 And from 21 to 23, 24 We invested in a lot of electrification and intelligent mobility related things Because we're a shareholder of Li Auto So in the whole electrification and mobility space We invested in two-wheelers Uh, Qiulong It's an electric off-road motorcycle Right, and its sales have been really, really good And later we also invested in a Singapore company called Strat And it is uh an electric smart wheelchair It also has self-driving capability Able to help you do some smart braking And it has very strong terrain capability And for people with disabilities and the elderly Uh, a very convenient wheelchair like this to drive It's from a DJI team A team that went and built it And afterwards we invested in a lot more DJI-related teams Because with DJI teams um, their chip integration capability tends to be stronger They're able to build a lot of complex robotic products and apply them in real-world scenarios The wheelchair is one example Right, and afterwards we also invested in things like Speed Dance which is where you can do strength training at home by yourself Right, it uses motors to generate resistance and can push back against you so um, you don't need weight plates anymore Then two very large direct-drive motors can replace the weight plates and one machine can achieve all kinds of functions Right, and this year we also invested in a lot of imaging products Right, so we're fairly familiar with the whole industry chain If we were doing a series of incubation projects now incubation would be relatively harder because you first need to help the team find a direction to start a business and figure out how to communicate with the market And then after that there's also uh like for example crowdfunding service providers and then for example ad-spend service providers Amazon operation agencies and then also these offline channels in Europe and the US distributors and dealers all kinds of dealers like that and then also actually it's about a product from finding the direction to finally making it on your prototype plan and then ODM factories yes for all of these we're actually doing this at scale sorting through all of this and then to help um founders who are this kind of engineer be able to find a reliable direction and then be able to quickly push the product to the people who really need it yes that's basically what we do wow so you live in Shenzhen not only engaging with these startup companies but also deeply engaging with all kinds of supply chain uh factory owners and all sorts of people yes because uh because because every founder who comes to Shenzhen needs to go through this whole process they need to run through everything and then in the process of starting their business these pitfalls can only be eliminated bit by bit and then this thing can truly be brought out so what we're thinking about is how to accelerate everyone's entrepreneurship that is to let them come to Shenzhen once and then make it as efficient as possible get everything done quickly and then find the solution that suits them best Only then can it be ensured because the hardware startup chain itself is very long right, so if if they shorten it, that would be great uh, this is also why we, as investors, would say that we accumulate more reliable friends around us and then be able to help entrepreneurs and then be able to bring products to market faster did you have any related background before this I actually don't have a related background because we used to look at consumer products born, right and then after I joined Yuanjing I kept looking at this direction and kept wanting to invest in more of these really great products and over these years in smart hardware and also in the AI direction, I've accumulated quite a bit more right, and because we've invested in quite a lot of projects so we can see for example, the projects we invested in earliest later developed very well and of course in between they may have encountered some problems we could also see how they solved them so it's kind of equivalent to uh, the smart hardware circle and including the whole engineer circle, we've accumulated quite a lot especially in Shenzhen, like DJI, and Insta, Anker, and also Yunjin almost all of those we've invested in so around us this has been built up this wave of engineers and then everyone might have some questions or some good resources, and they'll share with each other Just, just about yourself, roughly... For example, uh, what did you study back then? And have you always been doing city investment, investment? Ah yes, that's right, I went into investing right after graduation. Right, and before that I was at a tech-focused investment firm called Jiuhe Venture Capital. Then in the year 20... ...I came to, came to Yuanjin. I moved from Beijing to Shanghai at the time. Right, and last year it was also because, well... I saw more clearly some of the trends within this space. And things that were able to convince me. So I started spending more time on this. Okay, so if... If, for example, there is a founder in San Francisco... Can they connect with the engineers and resources you mentioned through you? You mentioned engineers and other resources— it sounds like you can help them find almost anything. Yes. But first, they need... deep engineering capability. In a particular field and direction, they need to be truly expert. They should be among the very best in that field. Second, they need to find... something they truly believe in, a real pain point that they can... address with a product that creates change. Exactly. Because... a CEO's most important job is to define the need and solve the pain point. They also need to be... deeply committed and willing to spend... years... trying to make that change. Hardware startups are incredibly difficult. The development chain is long. There are many pitfalls. And many very hard moments along the way. So they must be completely devoted to that direction. Many other things can be solved with time and effort, but the initial passion is essential.