36Kr Founder Liu Chengcheng Leads ByteDance's Doubao Mobile Assistant, Team on Par with Douyin

Liu Chengcheng, founder of 36Kr, currently heads ByteDance's AI hardware team Ocean, leading Doubao Mobile Assistant and all of ByteDance's AI hardware businesses, reporting directly to Zhu Jun, head of the AI product team Flow.

Liu once led 36Kr to go public on NASDAQ in 2019, then founded Whale Ling Tech to develop domestic operating systems and tablet hardware sold overseas. After ByteDance acquired the company, he and his team joined ByteDance.

After joining, he pushed for ByteDance's full acquisition of open-ear headphone brand Oladance (about $50 million) and led the launch of the first AI hardware Ola Friend. The AI glasses project was halted in February this year due to homogenization, and the team now focuses on Doubao Mobile Assistant. The Flow team (including Ocean) has the same priority as Douyin within ByteDance.