何嘉斌

李丰与何嘉斌把AI陪伴硬件定位为本轮技术周期的“第三波”：2023年看大模型，2024年主要看具身智能机器人（同时也有人讨论Agent），今天则要看谁能交付产品、创造需求并赚到钱。 Once foundational technology has absorbed decades of accumulated “vital energy” and made a major leap, its growth rate tends to flatten; the grandest software-and-hardware stories are also usually the hardest to commercialize, so opportunities spread into vertical applications. “It may not be the most AI-heavy product, but it must involve relatively new technology, scenarios, applications and ways to make money.”

Ropet的非共识不是把大模型塞进毛绒玩具，而是先用可爱、沉默的“弱机器人”获得开机率，再用闭源的行为数据长出智能。 Its camera continuously captures facial expressions, touch, smiles and gestures within roughly half a meter and a field of view of about 120 degrees; if 100,000 users eventually maintain high daily usage, this dataset would exceed the one-on-one pet-interaction samples available from ordinary home surveillance. 何嘉斌’s sequence is explicit: “First you have the hardware, then the behavioral data matched to that hardware, and only then can you call it intelligence.”

产品被定义为“百分百好玩，零分有用”，核心商业选择是避开工具硬件的配置与性价比竞争。 Ropet does not speak human language directly; it uses eye contact, movement and vocal tone to mimic the perception of a pet or a child aged zero to three. Strong conversational ability would make it feel like “a highly intelligent agent stuffed into a plush toy,” or like a two- or three-year-old suddenly arguing with its parents, undermining the sense of being a pet and the trust that comes with it. The team wants to trigger not the dopamine decay that follows novelty, but the urge to care, oxytocin and the satisfaction of “being needed.”

目前接近一万台的交付已经推翻了最初单一的用户画像，显示陪伴产品可能是全球、全年龄市场。 The team initially targeted urban women aged 24 to 30 who lived alone, but more than 50% of its core users in Japan are women aged 50 to 70, while many North American buyers purchase Ropet as a gift for children; roughly half of users still fit the original urban-woman profile. 何嘉斌 therefore calls the company a “future pet company”: desktop, bag-mounted, in-car and roaming home formats could all belong to the same category of “silicon-based pets.”

项目的早期商业验证来自极低预算下两次连续正反馈，而不是先靠融资堆出来的规模。 After four months of keeping the six-person, debt-laden company alive by borrowing from old shareholders, the team spent less than RMB10,000 on a booth at a Shanghai IP licensing fair, where 5 prototypes became the hottest new product. Old shareholders then continued to support the company, while individual shareholders raised roughly RMB10M more. At CES, the founder visited the US for the first time and hired an interpreter for about RMB1,500 a day; the product generated 6B views globally in backend statistics over 6-7 days, making the commercial value of something that could be touched, pre-ordered and delivered visible.

中国消费电子供应链构成了AI硬件最实在的结构优势，但首代产品仍必须承受漫长而昂贵的迭代。 Ropet went through 3-4 major hardware-selection changes from its first prototype to nearly 10,000 delivered units, with each change potentially causing at least a 2-month delay. To create genuine eye contact alone, the team insisted on 2 screens positioned at roughly a 15-degree angle and supporting dual-screen display; it is still working through servo noise, heat dissipation under the plush covering and quiet-fan design. “Be bolder”: building a roughly 50-point framework from mature components first, then iterating quickly through Shenzhen’s supply chain, is what makes mass production at least a year later possible.

智能升级是一条带条件的信任曲线，而不是首代产品把能力拉满。 Today’s 1 TOPS of edge compute must simulate vision, hearing, touch and gravity sensing at the same time. 何嘉斌 imagines that if the device can move to 10 TOPS at the same cost a year from now, while the company accumulates in-the-wild data from 20,000-30,000 units, the pet may grow from “3 years old” to “10 years old” and begin language interaction in an appropriate way. 李翔 contrasts this with the decline in Character.AI engagement and the stepwise progression of autonomous driving from L2 and L3 toward L4 and L5: consumer AI needs to “ship with low expectations first, then climb the AI ladder gradually.”