Ms Tang Yu

In what sounds like a page from a sci-fi novel, a Chinese technology company, NetDragon, has appointed an AI-powered virtual humanoid robot, as their new CEO of their subsidiary business just last week.

Heading Fujian NetDragon Websoft Co Ltd, "Ms Tang Yu" will be tasked with streamlining process flow, enhancing the quality of work, and improving the speed of execution. 

“The appointment is a move to pioneer the use of AI to transform corporate management and leapfrog operational efficiency to a new level”, says the firm in a press release.

Not to be outdone by her human counterparts, Ms Tang Yu will serve as a real-time data hub and analytical tool for day-to-day operations, as well as being enabled as a risk management system.

“We believe AI is the future of corporate management, and our appointment of Ms Tang Yu represents our commitment to truly embrace the use of AI to transform the way we operate our business”, explains Dr Dejian Liu (left), Executive Director and Chairperson of NetDragon.

“We will continue to expand on our algorithms behind Tang Yu to build an open, interactive, and highly transparent management model as we gradually transform to a metaverse-based working community”, he adds. 

By 2025, the worldwide metaverse market is expected to be worth $280 billion with players like Microsoft and Meta investing in it. 

Chinese companies too have been quick to jump in on the potential of the metaverse. Earlier this year, companies such as Alibaba, Bytedance and Tencent announced that they were staking huge amounts of money on the metaverse.