Volcano Engine, the cloud unit of TikTok owner ByteDance, has launched a new coding agent priced at just RMB 9.9 ($1.30) for the first month of subscription—underscoring the fierce competition in China’s booming AI developer tools market, reports the South China Morning Post. The Doubao-Seed-Code model, released on Tuesday, carries a standard monthly fee of RMB 40, according to a company statement. The company unveiled its discounted one-month promotion on November 11, China’s annual Singles’ Day shopping festival.
ByteDance has been accelerating its artificial intelligence push, with usage of its Doubao chatbot doubling in the past six months, Volcano Engine president Tan Dai said at a corporate event in October.
The growth, he added, highlighted the rapid rise in AI adoption among Chinese consumers and reinforced ByteDance’s position among the world’s leading AI players.