Li Zhifei, Founder and CEO of Mobvoi

TMTPOST -- More than a year after its Hong Kong IPO, AIGC-listed firm Mobvoi has launched its first major new hardware product: TicNote, a slim, AI-powered assistant device designed to magnetically attach to the back of a smartphone.

Unveiled on Thursday in Beijing, TicNote is touted as the world’s first Agentic AI hardware product. Backed by Mobvoi’s proprietary Shadow AI system—based on LLMs such as DeepSeek-R1—TicNote supports real-time transcription, summarization, and mind map generation. It boasts continuous recording of over 20 hours and supports 120+ languages. At just 3mm thick, it targets on-the-go professionals in fields like finance, writing, and education.

The TicNote Select Edition is priced at 1,499 yuan, while the Joy Edition retails for 999 yuan. An international version was previously launched in April at $159.99.

Mobvoi founder and CEO Li Zhifei said the company is not chasing sales volume with the new product. “This isn’t a pure hardware play,” Li said in an interview. “TicNote is a carrier for our Agent software. The value lies in continuous software upgrades, not shipping hundreds of thousands of units.”

Mobvoi plans to expand the Shadow AI ecosystem with upcoming products including TicNote smartwatches, wireless earbuds, and sports-focused wearables.

The launch comes as Mobvoi looks to stabilize following a 23% revenue decline in FY2024 to 390 million yuan and a net loss of 721 million yuan. Revenue from AI enterprise solutions plummeted nearly 93% to just 16.4 million yuan.

Once a frontrunner in AI hardware with its TicWatch and TicPods lineups, Mobvoi had previously pulled back from hardware amid financial strain. Now, Li believes the company has restructured into a lean, flexible operation. “A single engineer can now build an entire product,” he said.

Li was candid about past missteps, including overinvestment in smartwatches and voice-controlled hardware that relied heavily on marketing and hype. He also admitted the company has shelved development of its “Sequence Monkey” large language model just two months after launch, citing unsustainable R&D costs and competitive pressure from global giants.

“Large models are not something we can afford to play with,” he said. “Only a few global players can survive in that space.”

Instead, Mobvoi is returning to its roots: tightly integrated AI software and hardware tailored to niche but high-value user groups. TicNote, according to Li, avoids direct competition with smartphone giants like Xiaomi by focusing on product categories too small to draw their strategic attention.

Still, challenges remain. Overseas sales of TicNote have been modest, and Mobvoi’s share price has tumbled—falling 2.78% to HK$0.35 on Wednesday, giving the company a market cap of about HK$530 million.

Reflecting on his 13-year journey with Mobvoi, Li said entrepreneurship in China is often a battle against scale and incumbents. “In the U.S., if I built a large model and customers liked it, I’d make money—or get acquired. In China, that’s not how the game is played.”

Whether Shadow AI and TicNote can revitalize Mobvoi’s growth and reposition it within the competitive AIGC sector remains to be seen. For now, the company is betting that Agentic AI, not large models, will define the next phase of AI hardware.