Future Intelligent Raises Tens of Millions of RMB in Pre-A+ Round, Co-Led by Qiming Venture Partners
Future Intelligent focuses on R&D and scenario innovation for AI-powered office hardware.
On April 22, Future Intelligent announced the completion of a Pre-A+ round worth tens of millions of RMB, co-led by Qiming Venture Partners. The funding will be directed primarily toward overseas market expansion and R&D for new product form factors.
Founded in 2021, Future Intelligent focuses on AI-powered office hardware and scenario-driven innovation. Its flagship product line is the iFLYBUDS series of iFlytek AI meeting earphones, which integrate the company's self-developed viaim AI brain with earphone hardware to deliver practical, high-utility features — voice recording and transcription, meeting summaries, action-item extraction, AI Q&A, simultaneous interpretation, and AI voice substitution — that address pain points in workplace meetings and reshape how people work.
In January this year, Future Intelligent had just closed a Pre-A round of tens of millions of RMB. Securing two rounds within three months reflects not only market consensus on the long-term value of AI hardware, but also the emergence of dual moats for Future Intelligent in scenario dominance and commercial execution.
On scenario and mindshare capture: through pragmatic use cases and genuinely useful AI features, Future Intelligent has built a highly sticky user base among business professionals. According to official figures, since launching its first AI earphone product, the company has grown monthly active users more than 10x, increased monthly usage frequency 6x, achieved a 44% repurchase rate, and reached 76% user retention.
This traction shows up in market performance. During the full 2024 "Double Eleven" shopping period, iFlytek AI meeting earphone sales grew 59% year-over-year, ranking first across major e-commerce platforms in the AI earphone category. International research firm Frost & Sullivan found that for the AI meeting earphone market from 2023 through the first half of 2024, Future Intelligent ranked first in both total sales volume and sales revenue. Despite being only three years old, the company has already achieved sustained profitability.
Looking ahead, Future Intelligent's more ambitious growth curve is beginning to unfold. On the market front, the company has established a clear international expansion roadmap through its overseas brand viaim, with preliminary sales networks and user bases already in place across Singapore, Hong Kong, North America, and Europe. Its products' differentiated performance in cross-language, cross-scenario office environments has also attracted an initial cohort of international enterprise customers.
On the product front, Future Intelligent will use AI meeting earphones as a starting point to gradually expand into new form factors. CEO Ma Xiao said: "When building AI products, the principle should always be human needs across different scenarios. Imagine how a human assistant would behave in a specific situation — the product should be more perceptive, more accurate, and better at retaining and processing information than a person. We're thinking about how to better assist multi-person meetings and meetings involving diverse devices like PCs, and we're developing new product form factors around this direction. We want to go beyond satisfying the ear's need to 'hear,' and also address the eyes' and brain's needs — helping users see better and think more efficiently."
Qiming Venture Partners partner Wang Shiyu said: "In investment decisions, 'capturing segment leaders' is an important risk-reduction principle. The core reason we chose to invest in Future Intelligent is that its products precisely anchor the business meeting scenario, naturally combining AI technology with earphone hardware. Building on users' existing habits, it upgrades functionality through AI to boost office productivity — this 'scenario-first' go-to-market logic is more readily embraced by consumers. That said, the overall earphone market is no blue ocean, with strong competitors all around. In the 'plus AI' direction, well-cultivated user habits and a very large user base, combined with good enough products and sufficiently focused niche scenarios, can support and sustain an outstanding hardware company. We hope Future Intelligent can first thoroughly penetrate its scenario, satisfy the needs of its niche audience, and build a solid moat in the vertical track of business meetings. On that foundation, it can extend from its core scenario, using ultra-high penetration to generate word-of-mouth spillover, achieving the leap from vertical scenario to generalized demand, and developing into a nationally or globally recognized brand."
This round was co-led by Qiming Venture Partners and Shanghai International Group's Fortera Capital.
Past Coverage
Qiming Venture Partners was founded in 2006. The firm currently manages 11 USD funds and 7 RMB funds, with total assets under management reaching $9.5 billion. Since inception, it has focused on investing in outstanding early- and growth-stage companies in Technology and Consumer (T&C) and Healthcare.
To date, Qiming Venture Partners has invested in over 580 high-growth innovative enterprises. More than 210 of these have gone public on the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited, Shanghai Stock Exchange, and Shenzhen Stock Exchange, or exited through M&A and other means. Over 80 portfolio companies have become recognized unicorns or super-unicorns.
Many Qiming Venture Partners portfolio companies have grown into the most influential players in their respective fields, including Xiaomi (01810.HK), Meituan (03690.HK), Bilibili (NASDAQ:BILI, 09626.HK), Zhihu (NYSE:ZH, 02390.HK), Roborock (688169.SH), UBTECH (09880.HK), WeRide (NASDAQ:WRD), Gan & Lee Pharmaceuticals (603087.SH), Tigermed (300347.SZ, 03347.HK), Zai Lab (NASDAQ:ZLAB, 09688.HK), CanSino Biologics (688185.SH, 06185.HK), Schrödinger (NASDAQ:SDGR), MicroPort EP MedTech (688617.SH), Sanyou Medical (688085.SH), Amoy Diagnostics (300685.SZ), Berry Genomics (000710.SZ), Sinocelltech (688520.SH), Yuanxin Technology, ClinChoice, Belief BioMed, Biren Technology, and others.