Agent Neo Launches: A First-Hand Conversation with CEO Derek and CMO Guai Zi — The Starry-Eyed Founders Building the Ultimate AI Creation Tool

Yesterday, the flowith team officially "debuted" their new product Agent Neo at the AI Hacker House organized by "Crossroads." During the event, flowith gave a detailed introduction to this all-powerful Agent positioned for AI creators. We also took this opportunity to invite flowith's founder Derek and CMO lead Guai Zi to join us at Crossroads and share the story behind building Agent Neo.

In this podcast episode, Derek and Guai Zi discussed Agent Neo's features and use cases, and analyzed the strategic directions of current Agent products on the market along with their own assessments.

Meanwhile, flowith has developed considerable expertise in Xiaohongshu operations, and Derek and Guai Zi shared many of their insights and lessons learned during this recording. We hope you'll find them valuable.

(Image above: Agent Neo launch event @ AI Hacker House)

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Comment section giveaway for this episode: Leave a comment in the Xiaoyuzhou comment section for this podcast episode, and we'll give away 10 flowith membership redemption codes. Winners will be notified in one week via lottery draw.

🚥 02:50 flowith team introduction: Derek and Guai Zi's rapid-fire Q&A

04:36 flowith's fundraising, user scale, and revenue

05:53 flowith's new Agent product Neo: a super all-powerful Agent that makes you smarter and lazier

07:41 Agent Neo's emphasis: executing long tasks, outputting long-form content

08:43 Using "Crossroads" as an example — what can Neo do that other Agents cannot?

11:34 Longer steps, longer output, and more complex task execution: the inevitable direction for all Agents

13:04 Focused on the creative domain, aiming to achieve AGI for creation

14:09 No restrictions on creative format — whether text, image, or video

15:09 Agent Neo interactive feature example: continuing Empresses in the Palace for 100 episodes

16:42 Agent Neo interactive feature example: solving the hardest Level 3 problem in GAIA benchmark scoring

19:12 Agent Neo interactive feature example: building a 3D billiards mini-game

21:15 Agent Neo interactive feature example: creating a comprehensive official introduction for Black Myth: Wukong

24:33 The optimizations behind Neo's capabilities

26:21 Neo vs. Manus

28:21 Compared to other products, flowith has a relatively high barrier to entry — what's the team's view?

30:28 How the "infinite canvas" product was built

33:43 As the hottest niche赛道 of 2025, how does flowith view the industry landscape and competition?

35:30 Cloud-based vs. local browser

38:13 Vertical Agent vs. general-purpose Agent

40:33 "The boundary between general and vertical is actually quite blurry"

41:48 Agents are so hot right now — thanks to Manus

43:11 How did flowith achieve exponential growth in February-March, and what did they do right?

45:04 Xiaohongshu operations: flowith's lessons and insights

51:12 From vibe coding to vibe marketing

53:41 Lean team achieving low burn rate

57:29 Fundraising insights: last year and this year are completely different situations

59:22 Learning from Manus's experience — architectural considerations for fundraising should be made early

01:00:25 What could have been improved over the past year: being more confident in one's choices

01:02:33 Short-term goal: optimize the product; long-term goal: build the ultimate AI creation tool

01:03:54 A non-consensus view: general-purpose Agent model vendors have more room to grow, while startups' opportunity lies in vertical Agents

01:05:01 Besides flowith, the most-used tools are Cursor and Eleven Labs

01:06:39 A company and culture they particularly admire: Duolingo

Welcome to subscribe to the "Crossroads" podcast 🚦 We track the industry transformations and new entrepreneurial opportunities brought by the new wave of AI technology.

🚦 Crossroads is Steve Jobs's metaphor for Apple — describing it as standing at the intersection of technology and liberal arts, where great products are born. AI is now transforming every industry. We seek out, interview, and bring together a new generation of AI entrepreneurs and active participants in the AI era. Together with them, we explore and embrace the changes and new possibilities.

👦🏻 Host Koji: I co-founded Jiepang / The Fair / Tangdao, and launched AI Hacker House, a community space for a new generation of AI entrepreneurs. I believe technology, especially AI, represents the greatest value creation opportunity for our generation. Feel free to reach out to chat, bounce ideas, and connect on what's next. Koji on Jike, Koji's website

👧🏻 Host Ronghui: I've worked at a dollar-denominated VC and spent five years as a Silicon Valley correspondent, tracking technological development and business stories. Feel free to reach out and chat with me. Ronghui on Jike

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