"After Putting Down the Hammer That Was Looking for Nails, We Made Our First Million Dollars" | A Conversation with Mootion Co-Founder Tong Chao on Product-Making, the AI Video Startup Landscape, and Going Global

From models to applications, AI video products are emerging one after another.

This week, we invited Tong Chao, co-founder and Chief Product Officer of Mootion — a company that has focused on overseas markets since day one, reached 2 million users by early 2025, and achieved million-scale ARR — to share Mootion's entrepreneurial story in the AI video space.

You'll hear how Mootion users use the product, Tong Chao's reflections on "hammer-looking-for-nail" AI entrepreneurship, his views on whether model capability improvements will overwhelm applications, his insights on improving product experience, his analysis of the AI video field, and Mootion's analysis of Brazil and Arab markets as a company that went global from day one.

PS: Since this podcast was recorded via video call, Tong Chao played several Mootion videos at the beginning. From 03:07 to 04:42, the audio consists of video playback with narration. If you find this section hard to follow, feel free to skip ahead — we also asked Tong Chao to re-describe Mootion user use cases starting at 04:42.

🚥 Part 1: What is Mootion 01:12 Crossroads v.s. Mootion rapid-fire Q&A

02:47 Spending 5 minutes daily making a video with Mootion to post on Xiaohongshu — how many followers now?

04:57 Mootion use case categories: short video creators replacing original footage editing with generation; animated dialogue-style educational clips; professional creators making MVs, ads, etc.

06:10 No "viral hits" and not pursuing them — does this mean the real market pain point hasn't been hit yet?

08:11 AI as a tool has evolved from 20/100 to 50/100, but running a content account well depends on the user for the rest

09:00 On the recent viral unedited straight-output Tom and Jerry video, and being optimistic about test-time training

11:37 Looking at technology development history, "wrappers" often appear when a technology receives too much hype and discussion; foundation model improvements actually make application and product design capabilities more important

13:09 Model capability improvements become commodities — polishing products earlier is better than later

14:44 Product experience improvement insights: interview at least one user weekly, simplify video generation operations, optimize details, rapidly adjust based on user habits, invest in architecture and inference testing to reduce costs

20:32 "Anti-consensus" on AI video generation: Does AI know how to express a terrified shot? Why not wait for large models to reduce costs?

23:32 A simple "templates" feature brought an inflection point in revenue growth

24:43 Mootion users don't have a model selection feature — why was it designed this way?

25:50 "AI early adopters" v.s. long-term users — making trade-offs

🚥 Part 2: Entrepreneurship Insights: Founders Must Persist in User Interviews, Avoid "Hammer Looking for Nail" 27:51 Benefits of user interviews: keeping founders from being presumptuous

30:37 A common mistake for technically-backgrounded founders: hammer looking for nail

32:01 Mootion's "detour": built what was arguably the world's first 3D motion generation model, but struggled to find use cases

34:20 As former product lead at AInnovation, experiencing "hammer looking for nail"

40:59 The biggest characteristic of this AI wave is democratization — many possible evolution paths for technical approaches are visible

44:13 Meeting Ilya and Greg at OpenAI the week before ChatGPT's release

🚥 Part 3: AI Video Entrepreneurship Analysis 46:17 AI video entrepreneurship landscape, analyzing five categories of companies

50:26 "In terms of product innovation and experience, I really admire Descript," and veed.io, a product that grows with its users

53:28 Hopes for domestic AI video: wishing for more video models to emerge; most admired in the video model space is Keling AI

55:55 From an industry perspective, what did Keling AI do right? Following its own product rhythm, persisting, choosing internationalization relatively early

58:13 Video foundation model capabilities are still in a divergent phase; startup teams and major tech companies' investment results may run in parallel for some time

🚥 Part 4: Mootion's Global Expansion Experience 1:00:30 Mootion's three largest markets: Brazil, Arab region, United States

1:02:54 Brazil generally adopts new things quickly; Arab users are rigorous, requiring finding a small entry point

1:05:21 Taiwanese and Japanese user characteristics are very similar — difficult to win over, but highly loyal once converted

1:07:17 Three advantages for Chinese entrepreneurs going global: grounded/practical, having "secret menu" in growth and operations strategies, possessing both types of talent

1:09:24 Believing in the power of AI and users, global expansion no longer requires finding local "representatives"

Welcome to subscribe to the "Crossroads" podcast 🚦 We focus on new industry changes and entrepreneurial opportunities brought by the new generation of AI technology. Crossroads is Steve Jobs' metaphor for Apple — standing at the intersection of technology and liberal arts, where great products are born. AI is transforming industries across the board. We seek out, interview, and bring together "active actors" of the AI era, exploring and embracing new changes and possibilities together.

👦🏻 Host Koji: Co-founder of The Fair / Tangdao. I believe technology, especially AI, will fundamentally transform society and empower humanity. Welcome to chat with me, bounce ideas, and link to the next possibility. Koji on Jike, Koji's website

👧🏻 Host Ronghui: Works at a tech VC, former Silicon Valley correspondent for Yicai. Ronghui on Jike

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🎄 This podcast is supported by The Fair's Sound Forest Podcast Project.