Innovation Often Happens Where No One Has Gone Before | 5Y News Monthly
The big news from last month.
5Y News Monthly
"5Y News Monthly" is a regular column from 5Y Capital. At the start of each month, we look back at news from the past month about 5Y and our portfolio companies, sharing it with friends who follow us — we hope it helps you get to know us better.
01 Portfolio Company Highlights
Major news about funding, IPOs, strategic partnerships, breakthroughs, and new product launches from 5Y portfolio companies.
02 5Y Capital Updates
News about honors, investor interviews, and thought leadership from 5Y.
Note: Companies are listed in alphabetical order by pinyin.
01
Portfolio Company Highlights
Horizon Robotics and Zaihe Truck Form Strategic Partnership
On November 10, opening day of the 2025 China Commercial Vehicles Show (CCVS) at the Wuhan International Expo Center, new energy intelligent connected commercial vehicle upstart Zaihe Truck unveiled its next-generation intelligent driving mass production solution and formally signed a strategic partnership with Horizon Robotics, a leading passenger vehicle ADAS solution provider. The two sides will leverage Zaihe's full-vehicle R&D capabilities and Horizon's compute solutions and software algorithm strengths to achieve full-chain hardware-software co-optimization across "perception-decision-execution," accelerating the scaled deployment of intelligent driving technology in new energy heavy-duty trucks and contributing a practical model of "premium, intelligent, and green" development to the industry. Read more
Vastai Technologies and Changkun Technology Form Strategic Partnership
On November 11, Changkun Cloud Technology Co. and Vastai Technologies (Shanghai) Co. signed a strategic cooperation agreement in Shanghai. Both chairmen attended the signing in person, underscoring the importance of the partnership. This marks not only a critical step for Changkun Technology's deeper push into western China's computing market, but also signals a new opportunity for the "East Data, West Computing" initiative — with western computing hubs now benefiting from dual drivers of "technology + resources." The two sides will use Gansu as a core anchor point to jointly build a benchmark 10,000-PFLOPS-class computing hub in western China, injecting strong momentum into the region's digital and intelligent transformation.
HT Aero's First "Land Aircraft Carrier" Aircraft Rolls Off Production Line
On November 3, HT Aero's flying car mass production factory in Guangzhou's Huangpu District completed trial production and successfully rolled out its first "Land Aircraft Carrier" aircraft, marking the completion of the world's first flying car mass production line — also the world's first factory to use modern assembly lines for batch production of flying cars. Aircraft from this trial production run will be used for testing and flight trials to further validate product performance and manufacturing processes, laying a solid foundation for mass delivery of the "Land Aircraft Carrier" next year. Read more
Hypershell Closes $70 Million Pre-B and Series B Round
Hypershell, a global leader in consumer exoskeletons, announced on November 27 that it has successfully completed a $70 million Pre-B and Series B financing. The Series B was co-led by Luminous Ventures and 5Y Capital, with Meituan Longzhu participating; the Pre-B was led by Monolith, with 5Y Capital participating, and existing shareholders IDG Capital, HSG, and Oasis Capital all making超额跟投. Cygnus Equity served as exclusive financial advisor. Following this round, Hypershell's post-money valuation reached nearly $400 million, further cementing its position as an industry leader. Read more
StepFun and Huanxi Media Sign Strategic Cooperation Agreement
On November 11, 2025, StepFun and Huanxi Media entered into a strategic cooperation framework agreement. Under the agreement, the two sides intend to combine Huanxi Media's industrial advantages in film and television with StepFun's expertise in large language models to establish a joint venture for data cooperation and joint technology exploration, covering film and television creation, interactive entertainment, game development, and IP derivative products.
XtalPi and Eli Lilly Enter $345 Million Platform Strategic Partnership
On November 5, XtalPi (2228.HK) announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary Ailux, an AI-driven biologics R&D innovator, has entered into a multi-target strategic partnership and platform licensing agreement with global pharmaceutical leader Eli Lilly and Company, with a total potential value of up to $345 million, including tens of millions of dollars in upfront and near-term milestone payments. Lilly will leverage Ailux's proprietary platform to accelerate bispecific antibody discovery and development across multiple therapeutic areas, while also using its AI antibody R&D platform to accelerate internal pipeline research. This follows the $250 million AI small-molecule drug collaboration between XtalPi and Lilly in 2023, making XtalPi one of the very few AI drug discovery companies globally to have established high-value partnerships with leading international pharmaceutical companies in both AI large-molecule biologics and AI small-molecule drugs — once again validating its commercial value. Read more
SenseTime Partners with King Saud University
On November 12, SenseTime MEA announced a cooperation agreement with King Saud University. The two sides will jointly build an AI innovation center rooted in Saudi Arabia, exploring multi-industry AI application scenarios including education and scientific research. Meanwhile, SenseTime MEA is also building local computing infrastructure, which will use China-made chips to provide the computing resources needed by the innovation center and support technology and productivity development in local education, culture and tourism, smart cities, healthcare, energy, and other fields. Read more
Pony.ai, Sany Heavy Truck, and Dongfeng Liuzhou Motor Jointly Develop Fourth-Generation Autonomous Truck
On November 19, Pony.ai announced partnerships with Sany Heavy Truck and Dongfeng Liuzhou Motor to jointly develop a fourth-generation autonomous truck family. The fourth-generation autonomous truck system adopts a platform-based design with strong vehicle adaptability. The first two models will be based on the most advanced pure electric platforms from Sany Heavy Truck and Dongfeng Liuzhou Motor, developed for mass production at the thousand-unit scale, with first-batch operations planned to begin in 2026. The mass production of this series will advance autonomous truck technology development and application, enabling the industry's leap toward large-scale unmanned commercial operations. Read more
Aureka Biotechnologies Closes Tens of Millions of Dollars in Series A Funding
On November 10, Aureka Biotechnologies, a biotech company focused on generative antibody drug development, announced the completion of a tens-of-millions-of-dollars Series A round, co-led by 5Y Capital and Qiming Venture Partners, with existing shareholder New Alliance Capital continuing its investment, and Agentic Ventures and other institutions participating. The proceeds will be used to advance innovative pipeline candidates into critical clinical stages, accelerate the build-out of its wet-dry closed-loop antibody design intelligent agent platform, and expand deep partnerships with global biopharmaceutical companies. Read more
Moonshot AI Releases Kimi K2 Thinking
On November 6, Moonshot AI officially released its next-generation open-source reasoning model Kimi K2 Thinking, sparking renewed industry attention on AI Agent development. Defined as "the most capable Kimi model to date," this intelligent agent model is built on a "model-as-agent" training philosophy, achieving for the first time native "thinking while using tools" capabilities, and setting new records on multiple international authoritative benchmarks — signaling that open-source AI has officially entered the global technological frontier in complex task processing. Read more
02
5Y Capital Updates
Jiemian News Releases 2025 China Top Venture Capitalists List
On November 28, 2025, Jiemian News released its "China Top Venture Capitalists" list for the ninth time. Jiemian follows a rigorous selection process: preparation begins each August for that year's China Top Venture Capitalists and China Top Venture Capital Institutions lists, with directed research questionnaires sent out starting in September, the "China Top Venture Capitalists" list unveiled in November, and the "China Top Venture Capital Institutions" list published in December. **5Y Capital founding partner Qin Liu and partner Yuan Ye were named to the 2025 "China Top Venture Capitalists." Read more**
5Y's Xing Meng Named to PEDaily's 2025 "F40 China Young Investors"
PEDaily, the venture and investment information platform under Zero2IPO Holdings, has for eight consecutive years presented the "F40 China Young Investors" — where F stands for Fancy, representing boundless imagination, and Future, representing forward-looking vision. The list aims to identify outstanding Chinese investors under 40, discover the bold hunters behind unicorn companies, and record the stirring stories unfolding in the worlds of technology and business. On November 27, **the 2025 PEDaily "F40 China Young Investors" were officially announced, with 5Y Capital partner Xing Meng making the list. Read more**
5Y Wins Multiple Awards from ChinaVenture
On November 21, 2025, ChinaVenture released the "ChinaVenture Awards · 2025 Yangtze River Delta Region List." The list surveyed more than 300 equity investment institutions in the Yangtze River Delta region, using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods. Based on evaluation criteria including AUM, investment, and exit performance, selected institutions were assessed through preliminary screening, information verification, and final ranking, with market influence and reputation also considered. Institutions meeting the criteria were ultimately selected based on their scores. **5Y Capital was named to "ChinaVenture 2025 Best Venture Capital Institution in the Yangtze River Delta Region TOP30." Read more**
On November 27, ChinaVenture released its 2025 annual limited partner list. Through a composite process of questionnaire surveys, institutional interviews, data verification, and cross-validation, massive amounts of data were standardized and weighted to ultimately produce a quantifiable overall points ranking. This process serves as both a quantitative tracker of capital flows and a qualitative interpretation of market trends. **5Y Capital was named "ChinaVenture 2025 Most LP-Focused Venture Capital Institution in China." Read more**
5Y Wins Multiple Awards from ChinaVenture
On December 3, tech media outlet Jazzyear released the "2025 China Tech Industry Investment Awards," aiming to recognize investors, investment institutions, and other organizations with outstanding 2025 investment performance, strong growth momentum, and deep influence on China's tech industry development — contributing to the advancement of China tech industry investment. **5Y Capital was named to "2025 Best Tech Venture Capital Institution in China TOP50," and 5Y Capital founding partner Qin Liu was named to "2025 Best Tech Investor TOP30." Read more**
Qin Liu: Great Companies Don't Win a Single Battle — They Never Leave the Field
The 5Y Capital 2025 Founders' Annual Meeting was successfully held on November 2–3 Beijing time. At this gathering themed "Prompt() · Emergence," 5Y founding partner Qin Liu shared his observations on the current entrepreneurial environment, his long-term confidence in Chinese innovation and civilizational resilience, and how to maintain an infinite-game mindset for continuous iteration in the new technology cycle — treating both success and failure as inputs through reinforcement learning, and sustaining growth amid uncertainty. Read more
Yuan Ye: Five Perspectives for Understanding AI Entrepreneurship
During the 5Y 2025 Founders' Annual Meeting, 5Y partner Yuan Ye shared his observations on entrepreneurship in the AI era. He examined five perspectives on the structural changes underway in the AI age: the paradigm shift from mobile internet to AI, the evolution of supply boundaries, how mainstream interaction patterns will be reconfigured beyond Chat, how entrepreneurs should redefine "good product progress," and the logic of building organizational capability in this era. These perspectives may offer some inspiration for understanding AI-era entrepreneurship. Read more
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