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Tencent Music Beats Q2 Estimates as Content Expansion Fuels Growth

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Tencent Music Entertainment (1698.HK) reported stronger-than-expected second-quarter results on Tuesday, with revenue rising nearly 18% year-on-year to 8.44 billion yuan ($1.17 billion), surpassing analysts’ forecasts of 7.96 billion yuan. Shares of the U.S.-listed company jumped 6.6% in pre-market trading.

The growth was driven by an expanded content portfolio, including podcasts, audiobooks, and new music tie-ups that boosted user engagement and subscriber numbers. Tencent Music’s Super VIP program — which offers bundled services like high-quality audio, online karaoke, and exclusive events — has grown to around 15 million subscribers.

The company also expanded partnerships with global and domestic labels, striking first-time agreements with The Black Label and H MUSIC to tap into rising K-pop demand, while continuing collaborations with Chinese artists such as Wang Feng.

Revenue from music subscriptions climbed 17.1% to 4.38 billion yuan, offsetting an 8.5% decline in social entertainment services, which fell to 1.59 billion yuan. Tencent Music’s adjusted earnings reached 1.66 yuan per American Depository Share, beating expectations of 1.46 yuan.

In June, Tencent Music announced a $2.4 billion cash-and-stock deal to acquire Chinese audio platform Ximalaya, further strengthening its catalog and targeting deeper market penetration. Analysts at CFRA Research noted that product innovation, content diversification, and AI-driven personalization would likely support Tencent Music’s sustained growth trajectory.

China’s Moonshot AI Launches Open-Source Model to Regain Market Share

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Chinese AI startup Moonshot AI unveiled its new open-source model, Kimi K2, on Friday, aiming to regain traction in the highly competitive domestic AI market. The model is designed with advanced coding skills and excels in general agent tasks and tool integration, enabling it to handle complex workflows more efficiently, the company said in a statement.

Moonshot claims Kimi K2 surpasses several mainstream open-source AI models, including DeepSeek’s V3, and competes closely with top U.S. models like Anthropic’s in certain coding-related functions. This release aligns with a growing trend among Chinese AI firms to open-source their models, contrasting with many U.S. tech giants, such as OpenAI and Google, which keep their most advanced AI technologies proprietary. However, some American companies like Meta have also embraced open-source AI models.

Open-sourcing helps companies build stronger developer communities, showcase technological prowess, and extend global influence—a strategic move by China to counter U.S. efforts to restrict its tech progress. Other Chinese tech giants that have open-sourced models include DeepSeek, Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu.

Founded in 2023 by Tsinghua University graduate Yang Zhilin, Moonshot has become a key player in China’s AI scene, supported by major investors like Alibaba. The startup gained significant attention in 2024 for its long-text analysis and AI search capabilities but has seen its market position weaken after DeepSeek launched competitive low-cost models early this year.

According to the Chinese AI tracking site aicpb.com, Moonshot’s Kimi app was the third most-used AI product by monthly active users in August last year but slipped to seventh place by June 2025.

Rednote Joins Wave of Chinese Firms Releasing Open-Source AI Models

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Chinese social media platform Rednote (Xiaohongshu) has released an open-source large language model named dots.llm1, joining a growing number of Chinese tech companies making AI models publicly available. This open-source move contrasts with many U.S. tech giants like OpenAI and Google, which keep their most advanced AI models proprietary, although some American firms such as Meta have also embraced open-source AI.

The release aims to showcase China’s technological prowess, foster developer communities, and extend global influence amid U.S. export restrictions targeting China’s advanced semiconductor industry.

According to Rednote’s technical paper published last Friday on Hugging Face, dots.llm1 performs comparably on coding tasks to Alibaba’s Qwen 2.5 model but is less advanced than models like DeepSeek-V3.

Rednote, known for its Instagram-style platform where users share photos, videos, and text, ramped up AI development after OpenAI’s ChatGPT debut in late 2022. Recently, it launched Diandian, an AI-powered search app for its main platform.

Other Chinese companies following this open-source path include Alibaba, which introduced the upgraded Qwen 3 model in April, and startup DeepSeek, whose low-cost R1 model has made waves globally for its competitive performance despite lower development costs.