If Anyone Can Build an AI Product | The Wavo! Program from *Dark Tide* --- *Dark Tide* is launching Wavo! — a new initiative to support AI product builders. Here's what you need to know. ## What Is Wavo!? The premise is simple: AI has dramatically lowered the barrier to building software. A single developer with a good idea can now ship a product in days, not months. Wavo! is designed to find these builders and give them runway. The program will select a cohort of solo founders or small teams working on AI-native products — tools, agents, consumer apps, vertical solutions, whatever. Selected participants receive funding, cloud credits, and access to a network of operators and investors who have built in China's tech ecosystem. ## Why Now? The shift is real. Large language models have turned "vibe coding" into a genuine development paradigm. You don't need a 20-person engineering team to launch anymore. What you need is taste, speed, and a clear read on a specific problem. This also means more competition. The half-life of feature advantages has collapsed. Distribution and brand matter more than ever — but so does being first to a niche

Curated by | Waves Editorial Team

AI is a wave that belongs to everyone. Starting from technology itself, it extends into art, business, and onward to ever more complex and profound social questions. AI is increasingly permeating, participating in, and even fundamentally rewriting the rules of this world. Model capabilities evolve by the day, unleashing unprecedented productive power and generating oceans of content that would overwhelm any human mind. At the same time, AI has lowered the barrier to entry for nearly every professional skill, making hundreds upon hundreds of "hammers" readily available. This is a moment when everyone should be learning, thinking, and attempting to innovate.

Since the release of ChatGPT 3.5, business and technology have spiraled upward together. Waves has published dozens of articles documenting this transformation. Tech giants are placing big bets while jumping into the fray themselves; unicorns continue to announce major funding rounds. Image, language, video, and 3D models have only just begun to show technical progress, yet startups are already rapidly filling every crevice of daily life with AI applications.

On the side closer to individuals, a dazzling array of AI tools has brought entirely new paradigms of production. Anyone with imagination and execution can become a studio, a film crew, or an editorial team — the one-person company is on the verge of becoming a trend.

Beyond documentation, we too are absorbed, like any ordinary person, in thinking through the relationships between AI, ourselves, and the world — left with curiosity and confusion about "how to participate." From this, a rather radical idea was born: a social experiment.

Wavo! is our answer — a program initiated by Waves alongside partners from across industries, open to everyone. We are committed to lowering the barriers to understanding, using, and even building a business with AI as much as possible. Specifically, we want to find every ordinary person with a product idea, teach them the product development process and experience of the AI era through online public lectures, and provide deeper guidance and incubation for the most interesting ideas among them. We hope to create products with you that make people exclaim "Wavo!"

How does Wavo! work?

Wavo! consists of five components.

Lectures are public courses open to all. As the starting point of the program, we have partnered with model providers, cloud providers, product partners, and others to offer a series of free online lectures to everyone, working together to "turn ideas into products." Here you will learn every detail of the "zero to one" journey.

Community is the large community corresponding to the Wavo! program. This is the front line of Wavo! — online activities including Lectures will launch here first. Additionally, you can share perspectives and discuss ideas with everyone, and receive the latest updates and occasional perks from all our partners.

Ideas is a collection of creative sparks. We widely solicit ideas from everyone and display open ideas or those seeking teammates (unopened ideas will be kept strictly confidential). We will then work with our partners to select the most interesting concepts.

Fellows is the gathering of doers. Those who propose interesting ideas and plan to execute on them will enter this cohort. Together with our partners, we will do everything possible to help everyone realize their ideas, and provide longer-term support including product advice, technical guidance, tool access, compute subsidies, and capital acceleration.

Showcases are stage-gate demonstrations of progress. When this cycle of the program concludes, completed minimum viable products will receive our full suite of resource injections.

How to participate in Wavo!

You can watch Lectures through various public channels. If you have already joined the Community, you can also access Lectures video conferences directly within it. After livestreams conclude, we will upload recordings to multiple public channels for later viewing.

Throughout the Wavo! program, whenever you come up with any product idea, you can submit it through the Wavo! Ideas 💡 application form. After passing selection, you will enter Fellows to receive more help and support.

Regardless of whether you have prior background in AI, product, development, or related fields, we welcome you to participate in any of the above ways.

Participation in the Wavo! program requires no fees.

How to become a Wavo! partner? We are still recruiting additional partners to join.

Wavo! partners include five categories: model partners, cloud partners, product partners, media/community partners, and investment partners. They participate in various stages according to their willingness and needs — including promotion and distribution, Lectures teaching, Community building, Ideas selection, Fellows mentorship, and Showcases support.

We hope to help everyone turn ideas into products through diverse means. In principle, any organization that shares our anticipation of every individual's unlimited potential and is willing to provide concrete support can apply to become a Wavo! partner.

Wavo! Partners

Model Partners

Cloud Partners

Product Partners

Media/Community Partners

Investment Partners

• Listed in no particular order