☕️ Good morning, friends,

We’re kicking off this summer week with a chili-oil-noodles latte macchiato (😱).

Our BMW story on Friday brought us a record open rate—and even new subscribers from Bayerische Motoren Werke. A warm welcome to asiabits!

P.S. Over the weekend, 17 people got stuck on a roller coaster in Hong Kong—some in very uncomfortable positions. Our coaster-phobia really kicked in again.

P.P.S. All Labubus have been raffled off. For the rest of August, we’re gifting Amazon vouchers. 👇🏻

BENCHMARKS

NUMBER OF THE DAY

-20%

South Korea’s military shrank to 450,000 troops in just six years, driven by a dramatic decline in conscription-age men.

📉 Demographic collapse: The number of 20-year-old men fell by 30% to 230,000. The fertility rate is now just 0.75 children per woman.

⚔️ Dangerous imbalance: North Korea maintains 1.2 million soldiers. South Korea is already short 50,000 troops to meet readiness needs, including 21,000 non-commissioned officers.

Watch: South Korea is only the tip of the iceberg. Four of the five countries with the lowest fertility rates are in Asia. By 2050, one in three people there will be 65 or older.

Opportunities: This drives strong demand for eldercare, healthcare, and senior services. At the same time, the succession crisis is becoming acute and more companies are coming to market, which is fueling M&A activity, particularly in Japan.

TOP BIT

🏠 IKEA Accelerates China Expansion with JD.com

The furniture giant opened an official flagship store on JD.com last week. More than 6,500 products across 168 categories aim to reach millions of new customers. Thanks to JD Logistics, IKEA promises fast delivery to up to 301 cities, strengthening its omnichannel strategy.

The Details

📦 Logistics via JD: Goods ship from IKEA warehouses, with JD Logistics delivering 95% of orders within 24 hours.

🌐 Expanded Reach: Delivery to 301 cities, in addition to existing channels like Tmall, the IKEA app, and the WeChat mini program.

📈 Strong Online Growth: 370 million visits to IKEA’s digital channels in fiscal 2024; around 25% of revenue comes from online.

🚚 Investment in China: RMB 6.3 billion through 2027 to expand omnichannel, including more stores and greener logistics with a high EV share.

Why It Matters

• Reach Multiplier: JD gives IKEA access to millions of customers in cities without a physical store.
  

• Omnichannel Strategy: Multiple platforms reduce dependency and boost visibility.
  

• Speed as an Edge: Same- and next-day delivery raise customer satisfaction and conversion.

Background

JD.com is one of China’s largest e-retailers with a nationwide logistics network and over 600 million active customers.

At the end of July, JD.com became the largest shareholder of Ceconomy, parent of MediaMarkt and Saturn. The deal, worth about $4.8 billion, puts JD.com in a key position in Europe’s electronics retail market.

📊 All Data & Details: Reuters, Yicai, China Daily

PARTNERSHIP
Become Our Partner

Swap bot clicks and influencer blah-blah for genuine relevance.
asiabits reaches a growing daily community of young, international professionals who need to know Asia—before everyone else catches up.

Our native placements give you:

• High-quality attention in the right context

• 100 % format-audience fit

• Full brand safety—no BS, no distractions

Position your brand in the most relevant Asia newsletter in German-speaking markets.
👉 [email protected]

STARTUP OF THE DAY

🇨🇳 Wang Chuanfu

🔋 From battery tinkerer to EV champion: Wang Chuanfu founded BYD in 1995 with a loan from his cousin, first became the world’s largest maker of cellphone batteries, moved into autos in 2003, and later led BYD to the top of the plug-in market. In 2008, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway came on board with a $230 million investment. Today, from Shenzhen, Wang runs a vertically integrated manufacturing machine that builds almost everything in-house—from cell-chemistry labs to final assembly.

👉 Lesson learned: Build the bottleneck yourself. Owning core technologies in-house cuts costs, speeds delivery, and protects market share. Combine that with a wide model range at different price points, short development cycles, and regional supply chains to create a scalable lead competitors will struggle to close.

MARKET BIT

🔻 Chips: US takes 15% — China counters with security allegations

Details

💸 US Takes a Cut: Nvidia and AMD will pay 15% of their China revenues (incl. H20, MI308) to the US government in exchange for export licenses. A government official confirmed the model.

👀 Mistrust in Beijing: A CCTV-linked WeChat channel in China warns Nvidia’s H20 is “unsafe” and could even be shut down remotely via a hardware “backdoor”; Nvidia denies any backdoors.

🧩 HBM as Leverage: In trade talks, Beijing is pushing for looser export controls on High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). HBM is central to compute-intensive AI workloads.

Why It Matters

• Margins vs. Market Access: The 15% levy squeezes gross margins but opens China sales for H20/MI308.
  

• Security Narrative: Backdoor claims stoke regulatory uncertainty in China and raise audit, certification, and compliance burdens across the customer chain (cloud, OEMs).
  

• HBM Bottleneck: Easing HBM controls could shift cost curves and lead times across the AI stack (GPU + HBM), impacting roadmaps for hyperscalers and chip suppliers.

👉🏻 Full Story: CNBC, Axios

TOP READS

🏗️ Japan’s Construction Giant Taisei Acquires Toyo Construction for $1.1 billion: With combined annual revenue of $15.7 billion, the merged group comes close to matching Obayashi, Japan’s second-largest construction firm. The deal strengthens Taisei’s foothold in the expanding infrastructure market and reflects the industry’s broader consolidation trend. The global construction sector is projected to grow by 4.5 percent annually through 2028. Full story.

🤖 China Opens the World’s First Robot Store in Beijing: Launched during the World Robot Conference, the “Robot Mall” features more than 50 humanoid robots from 40 Chinese brands, including Unitree and UBTech. Visitors can watch the machines play soccer or perform traditional lion dances. China’s robotics market is projected to grow from $47 billion to $108 billion by 2028, yet despite investor excitement, models like UBTech’s Walker S still cost $135,000 and mass sales remain out of reach. Full story.

💻 South Korea Builds National AI Models Against US-China Dominance: Five consortia led by SK Telecom, LG and Naver develop open-source models using domestic technology from chips to software, set to launch in 2025. The country leverages its strengths in memory chips and AI infrastructure to position itself as an alternative to American and Chinese systems and secure digital sovereignty in critical sectors like healthcare and defense. Full story.

OPTIONAL READS

Hong Kong: AirAsia plans connectivity network expansion and considers secondary listing on the Hong Kong stock exchange. More on that.

Vietnam: More Vietnamese bananas are taking over Japanese supermarkets, displacing competition from the Philippines. More on that.

Singapore: Stock exchange reports a record profit of $475 million, up 15.9%, thanks to higher trading volumes. More on that.

FORTUNE COOKIE

Soon it’ll be that time again: the asiabits team will enjoy the “pleasure” of riding Deutsche Bahn in September.

To sweeten the inevitably painful experience, we’re thinking of bringing along the ayi dance group from the video above.

Chinese women in midlife love to dance—and they won’t stop even on trains.

The ladies in the video got plenty of online hate; we, on the other hand, celebrate them!

Germany’s dining cars are usually out of service anyway—so why not cut a rug right there?

📬 Got Something Funny, Interesting, or Noteworthy from Asia? Send it to [email protected] and we’ll feature it here!

As a thank-you, you’ll receive the exclusive asiabits China snack box filled with half a kilo of treats!

FEEDBACK

See you tomorrow in your inbox, 

Thomas, Michael & the Team of asiabits