ATR Daily: Tencent wants to give everyone access to OpenClaw
QClaw is launching for international users after hitting 1M downloads in 10 days
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Tencent wants to give everyone access to OpenClaw
Would you trust a Chinese company with your data? Tencent is betting international users will after it launched its AI agent, which is based on OpenClaw, for users outside of China.
The Chinese version of QClaw, as it is called, has already racked up more than one million users within two weeks of launching.
The English version runs on Mac or Windows devices, but to get access you need to complete a form on the website and then hope you are one of the selected 20,000 ‘founding’ members.
Tencent said the international version was built in five days with OpenClaw doing 99% of the code. That’s completely believable if you’ve used OpenClaw. The bot’s ability to develop and refine itself is one of the most interesting features, but the code and processes need supervision over time.
Tencent says QClaw includes a built-in “AI Security Gateway” and that permissions or the program itself can be shut down via settings. On data, it says that “some input and output data may be temporarily stored on our servers for up to 24 hours” but it claims local files are not permanently uploaded or retained.
That makes sense, too, but it’s not advisable. OpenClaw and other agent platforms are best installed on a spare computer or a VPS rather than your main device just in case things go wrong since this is very new technology that’s evolving.
OpenClaw creator Peter Steinberger gave the product an endorsement for working directly with his team, suggesting it is a good option for those who aren’t comfortable with using the terminal application that’s typically favoured by coders.
The project is interesting, but even the most ardent OpenClaw fans I know have moved to Claude after Anthropic prevented use of its subscription within OpenClaw. Claude has built most of the core pieces that make OpenClaw attractive and that without any need for technical knowledge or bugs. That makes it easy for tech people and those less experienced.
Personally, I still use OpenClaw and I would recommend anyone curious to dabble. Using the terminal isn’t that hard. I made this short guide that’s helped dozens of people hop on the OpenClaw wagon.
Still, this is an interesting move from Tencent. Over the years, it has tried to make products that can extend its reach outside of China but it’s not come close to replicating WeChat, with its billion-plus user base and ecosystem of mini apps. We might see the company put significant focus on QClaw since messaging on its website suggests it plans to charge for the service in the future.
Alibaba and Tencent in place to invest in DeepSeek’s first external funding round
Elsewhere in China AI news, there’s more colour of DeepSeek’s rumoured new round. The Information reports that Tencent and Alibaba are in talks to do a deal at a valuation of around $20 billion. The startup, however, is reportedly not planning to sell more than 3% of its shares.
These details make sense given DeepSeek’s background and the nature of China’s AI investment landscape.
DeepSeek was spun out of Hangzhou-based hedge fund High-Flyer so this would be its first external fundraise. The startup has self-funded to date, specialising in doing more with limited resources as we’ve written before, so any investors it welcomes would need to provide more than just capital, which it already has access to. Connections, distribution, talent and other areas may be far more valuable to its development.
As for said investors, Tencent and Alibaba have backed China’s top emerging AI companies for years including Kimi, MiniMax and Zhipu. Both stack up as value-add investors and no doubt they’ll be keen to own a slice of DeepSeek, even if it isn’t a huge one. Given what has happened with Manus, endorsement from China’s top two tech companies may also help DeepSeek as it navigates being a Chinese company offering a global product.
In other interesting news you won’t want to miss:
No journalist knows supply chains quite like Tim Culpan, so his reflections of Tim Cook’s time as Apple CEO is uniquely insightful and worth your time [Culpium]
A former Samsung research got a seven year jail sentence for leaking semiconductor technology to a Chinese company [Reuters]
Apple launched Tap to Pay in Malaysia, which is only the second market for product in Southeast Asia behind Singapore, of course [Apple]
Memory maker SK Hynix is surging on the AI boom, surpassing Samsung as Korea’s most valuable company, and now it will invest $13B to develop a new plant in order to meet growing demand [Reuters]
Yesterday we had robots smashing human half marathon records, today a robot from Sony has beaten elite level table tennis players, but it wasn’t a clear sweep… yet [Reuters]
Lovely tech roundup, as always!