Battle of the Giants: ByteDance, Alibaba, and Jieyue Reshape the 12 Billion Yuan Audio Economy

Major Chinese tech companies ByteDance (parent company of Doubao), Alibaba, and startup Jieyue have entered direct competition in the audio technology market, which experts call the "sound economy." The market is estimated to be worth 120 billion yuan (approximately 1.7 billion US dollars). The main battleground is the development of artificial intelligence models for speech synthesis and processing, which enable the creation of high-quality audio content, including podcasts, audiobooks, voice assistants, and personalized sound scenarios. ByteDance is betting on integrating its Doubao models with its app ecosystem (TikTok, Toutiao), Alibaba on leveraging voice technologies in cloud services and smart home devices, and Jieyue on specialized solutions for voice and music generation. Analysts note that a key factor will be not only the quality of synthesis but also the ability to control users' "hearing" — personalizing the audio experience based on behavioral data.