Strategic Reflections on the KAI Large Model Market Project

Karl / Karl

Memo

I. Strategic Opportunity & Core Value

Over the past two days, I have been continuously digesting your vision regarding the “China Large Model Export Market,” “AI Token Pricing Power,” and “New Trading Infrastructure in the AI Era.” Frankly speaking, I initially approached this primarily from a product and technical perspective. However, upon deeper reflection, I increasingly realize that the true value of this initiative does not lie in building a simple AI aggregation platform, but rather in establishing a price discovery mechanism and a liquidity system uniquely belonging to China’s own AI industry. If this direction can be successfully established, its strategic significance will far exceed that of an ordinary AI product.

II. Strategic Evolution & Organizational Restructuring

Yet, precisely because of this, I see a critical challenge: many companies fail not due to an incorrect strategic direction, but because their organizational capabilities fail to upgrade in tandem with their strategic evolution. Over the past years, whether in the traditional internet, mobile internet, blockchain, or AI industries, truly successful cases share a common trait: prior to a strategic breakthrough, an organizational restructuring is almost always completed first. When Amazon built AWS, they did not task their existing e-commerce team with cloud computing. When Tencent created WeChat, it wasn’t just a new department appended to the QQ organization. When Binance transitioned from spot to futures trading, and from an exchange to an ecosystem, it also relied on an independent team and an autonomous decision-making mechanism.

III. Exploratory Organization & Decision Costs

Product

The reason is simple: when a project enters an entirely new track, it requires an exploratory organization rather than a maintenance organization. Maintenance organizations excel at ensuring stability, while exploratory organizations excel at breaking boundaries. The two require completely different capability structures. The Large Model Market project is fundamentally not an ordinary product upgrade. It is a strategic evolution from a traditional exchange into a next-generation digital commodity market. In this upgrade process, the greatest challenge is often not technology, but organizational efficiency. If there are too many organizational layers, if the information pathway is too long, and if decision- making is too slow, even the most brilliant strategy will be consumed by internal friction. In particular, the pace of development in the AI industry has far surpassed the traditional internet era. What used to take a quarter may now need to be completed in a single month. Work that previously required a dozen people can now be achieved by just a few Product Engineers leveraging AI tools. Therefore, I increasingly align with a rising organizational trend in Silicon Valley: lean core talent + flat management + high empowerment. Rather than deploying twenty average executors, it is far better to have five individuals who can think independently, deliver autonomously, and take full accountability for results. In the AI era, the greatest costs are no longer the cost of code, but the costs of decision-making and communication. The real bottleneck of a project is rarely a lack of manpower, but a shortage of people who can directly translate strategy into products and systems.

IV. Blueprint of KAI Market Infrastructure

I believe this is particularly critical for KAI at its current stage. What we are discussing now is no longer simple pages or features, but a brand-new market infrastructure: 01 AI Token Standard System 02 AI Model Rating System 03 AI Market Quoting System

04 AI Vendor Matching System 05 AI Token Liquidity System 06 Potential future expansions into AI Indices and AI Settlement Systems If successful, it could become a pivotal hub for China’s AI global expansion in the future. However, such projects cannot be driven through traditional means. It requires a small yet agile core operational unit. 4 to 5 people are sufficient in the early stages, but every individual must possess cross-disciplinary capabilities: they must understand business, leverage AI tools effectively, and participate directly in product design and system implementation. The goal is not to expand team size, but to maximize per-capita output.

V. Phased Implementation Roadmap

My understanding is that the priority at this stage is not immediate transaction execution, but establishing price discovery capabilities through a clear three-step roadmap: Step 1: Establish the ‘AI Market’ Allow users to view model pricing, capability ratings, historical trends, industry news, and vendor updates. Step 2: Build the ‘Vendor Market’ Enable direct matchmaking and procurement connections between model providers and buyers. Step 3: Extend Circulation Mechanism Decide whether to extend into Token circulation and financialized markets based on real demand. This approach minimizes the cost of trial and error while aligning with market dynamics.

VI. Resource Autonomy & Parallel Execution

If the company wishes for me to take on this responsibility, I am fully committed to dedicating myself to it. At the same time, I hope to be granted the resources and decision-making autonomy that match these objectives. Those who are ultimately held accountable for results must have the authority to define the path to

implementation; otherwise, a mismatch between responsibility and authority will inevitably arise. My intention is not to build a separate system, let alone detach from the existing framework. Rather, it is to establish a more focused, high-efficiency execution unit within the current KAI ecosystem specifically for this strategic direction. KAI will continue to develop its core business, while a lean team concurrently drives the AI Market initiative. Advancing these two lines in parallel ensures that existing operations are undisturbed while providing the new direction with the agility needed to validate the market rapidly.

I believe that what ultimately determines a project’s success is not how grand the narrative is, but whether we can continuously break down strategy into products, products into systems, and systems into deliverable results. If we can successfully execute this, I am confident it will not be just a mere product upgrade, but the most vital growth engine for KAI’s next phase. Respectfully submitted, Karl