Tech Brief (March 23): ByteDance Sells Game Studio to Saudi Wealth Fund

Published: Mar. 23, 2026 3:11 p.m. GMT+8

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ByteDance sells game studio Moonton to Saudi wealth fund

ByteDance Ltd. has agreed to sell its video game studio Moonton to a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, according to an internal letter seen by Caixin. Moonton will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Savvy Games Group, a unit of the Public Investment Fund (PIF), Moonton CEO Zhang Yunfan said in the letter. The studio’s management structure will remain unchanged, with its headquarters staying in Shanghai and Zhang continuing as CEO. Zhang said the partnership with Savvy would bring broader development opportunities and provide accelerated vesting and payouts of previously granted long-term incentives to employees.

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ByteDance sold its game studio Moonton to Saudi Arabia’s Savvy Games Group, with Moonton’s CEO and Shanghai HQ unchanged.
XPeng recorded its first-ever quarterly profit (380 million yuan) in Q4 2025, while annual revenue grew 87.7% to 76.7 billion yuan.
Tencent restructured its AI Lab into the Hunyuan team; Xiaomi launched three AI models; Unitree Robotics filed for a 4.2 billion yuan STAR Market IPO.

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Who’s Who

ByteDance Ltd.: ByteDance Ltd. has agreed to sell its video game studio Moonton to Savvy Games Group, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund. Moonton's management structure and headquarters in Shanghai will remain unchanged, with CEO Zhang Yunfan continuing in his role. This move is expected to provide broader development opportunities for Moonton.

Moonton: ByteDance has agreed to sell its video game studio, Moonton, to Savvy Games Group, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund. Moonton will become a wholly-owned subsidiary, but its management structure and Shanghai headquarters will remain unchanged, with Zhang Yunfan continuing as CEO. This partnership aims to provide broader development opportunities and accelerate employee incentives.

Public Investment Fund (PIF): The Public Investment Fund (PIF) is Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund. Its subsidiary, Savvy Games Group, has acquired the video game studio Moonton from ByteDance Ltd. Moonton will continue its operations with its headquarters in Shanghai and its current CEO, Zhang Yunfan. This acquisition is expected to provide Moonton with new development opportunities and employee incentives.

Tencent Holdings Ltd.: Tencent Holdings Ltd. is consolidating its AI efforts, integrating its AI Lab into the Hunyuan large-model team to sharpen its focus on AI development. This move includes transferring personnel and restructuring leadership. Additionally, Tencent's WeChat has launched the ClawBot plugin, allowing users to integrate OpenClaw directly into the messaging app for interactive chats.

XPeng Inc.: XPeng Inc., a Chinese electric vehicle maker, achieved its first-ever quarterly net profit of 380 million yuan ($5.5 million) in the fourth quarter of 2025. The company also significantly narrowed its full-year net loss to 1.1 billion yuan in 2025, from 5.8 billion yuan in 2024, with annual revenue surging by 87.7% to 76.7 billion yuan.

Unitree Robotics: Unitree Robotics has filed for an IPO on Shanghai's STAR Market, aiming to raise 4.2 billion yuan ($608 million). The company experienced a rapid and profitable shift from quadruped robots to humanoid models, which are now its main revenue source. It reported net losses in 2022 and 2023, but became profitable in 2024 with a net income of 94.5 million yuan. For the first nine months of 2025, Unitree recorded a net income of 105 million yuan on 1.2 billion yuan in revenue.

Xiaomi Corp.: Xiaomi Corp. launched three in-house artificial intelligence large models to compete in the generative AI race. The models include its flagship base model, Xiaomi MiMo-V2-Pro; a multimodal base model, Xiaomi MiMo-V2-Omni; and a speech synthesis model, Xiaomi MiMo-V2-TTS, designed for AI agent reasoning, multimodal processing, and voice interaction.

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