TikTok's ByteDance makes AI phone that can order the cheapest product without a touch

The owner of TikTok has now created its own AI-first phone that comes with deep integration of Doubao, China's most advanced and popular artificial intelligence assistant.

ByteDance is offering the so-called ChatGPT of China to major phone makers, but since they are still mulling whether to let its ubiquitous AI platform take over, it tasked ZTE's Nubia to make a prototype and showcase what its first AI phone is capable of.

The ByteDance phone retails for the equivalent of $490 as a developer platform, but sold out quickly and is now available at a markup on the secondary market.

The AI assistant of TikTok's founding company can automate numerous tasks when using the phone, like finding and ordering the product that the user is looking for at the lowest possible price from a reputable vendor.

The Doubao assistant on the Nubia M153 AI handset can understand the content shown on the screen by any third-party app, and react according to the commands that the user gives it in a conversational manner. The phone can book a table or a whole trip, edit photos, and buy the stuff that the user has seen in someone's TikTok video, for instance, all without touching the screen save for confirming the payment as a last step.

Doubao has nearly 55 million active users in China, and its AI infrastructure is breathing down Google Gemini's neck when it comes to token turnover for daily queries, so any hardware or software move that solidifies its prominence as the premier AI assistant in China is bound to make waves in the industry.

So far, said waves have been mostly groundswell as, sensing the threat, WeChat already blocked the ByteDance phone's AI assistant from logging in and accessing its services.

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