Taking AI Abroad: Start Where You Can Survive, Not Where You Feel Most at Home—Liu Run, with Robin’s Commentary

Entrepreneurship means starting where you are most likely to survive, not where you feel most at home. Taking AI abroad has followed a counterintuitive path. Over the past several decades, Chinese companies generally followed the route of “surviving the pile of casualties at home, then taking an overwhelming advantage abroad.” They battled fiercely in the Chinese market, refining exceptional value for money and supply-chain capabilities, then took that playbook overseas to outmatch competitors. Winning at home was the entry ticket to international expansion. But a different pattern has begun to emerge in AI. Shenzhen-based Plaud AI launched a card-style AI recording device. Rather than rolling out across China first, it entered Europe and the United States directly. Within two years, sales exceeded one million units, making it a recognized leader in the category. Only after proving its business model did it return to China in October 2025 to develop its domestic market. Why did these founders not choose the Chinese domestic market first? The reason is practical. Having an AI agent carry out a complex reasoning task consumes a tremendous amount of computing resources. Europe and the United States have a mature SaaS subscription culture: businesses and individuals are accustomed to paying US$20–50 a month for software services. That spending per customer is sufficient to cover agents’ high computing costs. In China, however, the habit of paying substantial recurring fees for “invisible software services” is not yet fully developed. If a startup insists on launching from scratch domestically, every user question consumes costly computing resources while users are unwilling to pay monthly. The business can easily end up losing more the more it does. When your resources are limited, set aside the attachment to your home market. Refine your product where you can make the business economics work, then return with a validated answer. That may be the more practical path. In short, start where you can survive, not where you feel most at home. #LiuRunBusinessReportInterpretation ---- Robin: “Whether to succeed locally before going abroad or begin in the market with the greatest opportunity tests a founder’s thinking. At home or overseas, establish a secure base before expanding. That gives you firmer footing. Do not spread yourself across too many fronts and end up doing none of the markets well.”