Hi everyone. I’m Stephanie LI.

Coming up on today’s program

• “Ne Zha 2” breaks into global top 18, nearing 10 billion yuan milestone;
• Alibaba confirmed partnership with Apple to bring AI function for iPhone.

Here’s what you need to know about China in the past 24 hours

China's box office sensation “Ne Zha 2” is rewriting cinematic history, storming into the global all-time top 18 just 16 days after its release while closing in on the unprecedented 10 billion yuan mark worldwide.

As of 3 pm on Thursday, the film has surpassed “Black Panther” to gross over 9.8 billion yuan (including pre-sales), becoming the first Asian film to break into the top 18 of the global all-time box office chart and ranking 4th among all animated films.

Debuting during the 2025 Chinese New Year holiday, “Ne Zha 2” has maintained remarkable momentum at the box office.

The film set a new record for the highest single-day earnings for an animated feature in Chinese cinema history, raking in an impressive 486 million yuan on its opening day.

“Ne Zha 2” has been smashing all kinds of records both domestically and globally, including being the highest-grossing film in a single market, the most lucrative IMAX release in China, the most popular movie in China with nearly 200 million views, the first non-Hollywood movie to enter global box office top 20, etc., and there will likely be more to come. 

After limited screenings in North America, Australia and New Zealand, “Ne Zha 2” is now rolling out across multiple international markets, including Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, South Korea, Egypt, South Africa and Pakistan.

Based on the presale situation, North American audiences have shown great enthusiasm for “Ne Zha 2,” with occupancy rates exceeding 90 percent. In some showings, tickets are hard to come by. In Australia, the presale for “Ne Zha 2” screenings has also exceeded expectations.

Industry analysts forecast overseas earnings between USD120 million and 200 million, with early demand suggesting strong crossover potential.

The film's phenomenal success has also fueled a surge in related stock prices. Enlight Media, the film's primary producer and distributor, hit the daily trading limit of 20 percent for the fourth day today to reach an all-time high, with market cap increased by more than 50 billion yuan.

Within 7 consecutive trading days since the Spring Festival, Enlight has risen from 9.53 yuan to 28.94 yuan today, skyrocketing by 200 percent.

Media calculation estimated that Enlight would be able to earn 3.14 billion yuan to 3.34 billion yuan in revenue if the box office of “Ne Zha 2” reaches 16 billion yuan. For comparison, the firm’s 2023 revenue was 1.55 billion yuan.

Greater Bay Area, Greater future

• Hong Kong's IPO market kicked off on a higher note in 2025, led by a significant rise of companies from the Chinese mainland, including the world’s biggest battery supplier CATL and bubble tea maker Guming Holdings. According to financial data service Wind and HKEX, 40 companies have filed for IPOs in Hong Kong as of February 3, 2025, doubling from 20 seen in the same period last year. Nearly all of those 40 companies are from the Chinese mainland.

Next on industry and company news

• Chinese tech heavyweight ByteDance announced on Thursday the launch of its new model architecture, UltraMem, which reduces the inference costs of artificial intelligence-powered models by up to 83 percent. According to the company's Doubao LLM team, UltraMem enhances the inference speed by 2 to 6 times compared to traditional MoE (mixture-of-experts) architectures. Meanwhile, Baidu announced today that its AI chatbot Ernie Bot will be free starting April 1, as LLM upgrades and cost reductions continue. In addition, the Chinese tech giant unveiled a deep search function today, which will also be free from April.
• Alibaba chairman Joe Tsai confirmed reports that the Chinese tech company will partner with Apple on AI for iPhones sold in the Chinese market, while speaking at the World Governments Summit in Dubai on Thursday. Alibaba once jumped over 9 percent in Hong Kong today, touching a 3-year high.
• Baidu is in talks with UAE officials to test its robotaxi services Apollo Go in Dubai as early as in the first half of this year, media reported today.
• Huawei’s Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance said it will roll out a limited three-year zero-interest financing policy for the new Luxeed S7, as the NEV brand under the Huawei-Chery Auto cooperation joins the price war in China against Tesla, Nio, and XPeng Motors.
• CATL topped global power battery sales chart for eighth consecutive years with cumulative usage of 339.3 GWh in 2024, followed by BYD, LG Energy, and CALB, SNE Research's data showed. Six Chinese battery makers made the top 10 list.
• Dongfeng Nissan's upcoming N7 electric sedan integrates DeepSeek’s R1 AI model to provide a more mature interaction experience, becoming the first automotive JV in China to do so, media reported yesterday. The N7 made its global debut at the Guangzhou auto show last November.
• China's main policies supporting sci-tech innovation and the development of the manufacturing industry saw tax cuts, fee reductions and tax refunds totaling 2.63 trillion yuan in 2024, official data showed on Wednesday.
• Japanese companies are increasingly confident about their prospects in the Chinese market amid recovering demand, according to a new survey released yesterday by the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in China. About 58 percent of Japanese companies operating in China said they would "significantly increase," "increase," or "maintain" their investment scale, up 3 percentage points compared to the previous year.

Wrapping up with a quick look at the stock market

• Chinese stocks fell after rising on Thursday. The benchmark Shanghai Composite slid 0.4 percent and the Shenzhen Component shed 0.8 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index closed down 0.2 percent and the TECH index slipped 0.9 percent.

Executive Editor: Sonia YU

Editor: LI Yanxia

Host: Stephanie LI

Writer: Stephanie LI

Sound Editor: Stephanie LI

Graphic Designer: ZHENG Wenjing, LIAO Yuanni

Produced by 21st Century Business Herald Dept. of Overseas News.

Presented by SFC