From IP to Intelligent Manufacturing, the dual-wheel driven strategy of VIRTUAL MIND (01520) opens the channel for high growth.

Since the beginning of this year, the highly recognizable Chinese trendy IP "LABUBU" has quickly gained popularity overseas, not only driving the stock prices of related listed companies to reach new highs, but also keeping the concept of IP economy stocks continuously in the market spotlight. The overseas success of LABUBU is not accidental. In recent years, the global IP economy has shown strong growth momentum and has gradually become an important engine driving economic development. IP licensing has formed a large and continuously expanding market, constantly breaking traditional consumption boundaries, sparking diverse consumer demands, and injecting new vitality into the global consumer market. According to the data from the International Licensing Industry Association, the global market size of licensed goods and services reached $356.5 billion in 2023, with a high compound annual growth rate of 5.0%; the IP market in China also performed well, with the licensing scale surpassing 168.9 billion RMB in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 40%, ranking as the fourth largest IP licensing market in the world. This growth is driven by multiple favorable factors of policy and market: the national intellectual property strategy has established a institutional foundation for the healthy development of the industry, the continually growing middle-income group is unleashing consumption potential, and the emotional identification and enthusiastic participation of Generation Z in IP is further promoting the transformation of IP from a cultural symbol to a consumer asset. With the market expanding, emerging technologies such as blockchain are providing new solutions to long-existing pain points in the IP licensing field such as difficult copyright authentication, lack of traceability, and opaque revenue sharing, gradually constructing a more trustworthy and efficient value circulation system. Against this backdrop, VIRTUAL MIND (01520) is proactively developing a "smart consumption + smart manufacturing" dual-drive strategy: on one hand, through artificial intelligence, digitalization, and blockchain technology, they are deeply cultivating the IP value ecosystem, expanding the incremental space of existing businesses; on the other hand, they are extending their business to the industrial sector, using cutting-edge technologies to support the intelligent upgrade of manufacturing industry and global deployment. This strategy not only responds to the trend of deep integration of digital economy and real economy, but also opens up broader avenues for long-term growth for the company. Smart Consumption: Exploring a new blue ocean of IP digital assets In the field of smart consumption, VIRTUAL MIND relies on its existing IP resources, focusing on three major business segments: IP digitalization, IP commodity trading, and IP community operation, gradually constructing a blockchain-based digital asset IP chain covering the globe, providing comprehensive services for rights confirmation, traceability, and value empowerment for cultural creativity, trendy toys, digital art, etc. In the IP digitalization process, the company plays the role of "IP investment bank", transforming physical IP products into verifiable and tradable digital assets. Specifically, each physical IP collectible will be bound with a unique digital identifier, registered on the blockchain, to achieve "one code, clear ownership"; at the same time, with the use of artificial intelligence technology, the company can leverage IP to create more authentic interactive storytelling and gamified experiences, generating dynamic digital content that is participatory and derivative. In the IP commodity trading process, the company collaborates directly with authorized IP holders to ensure that each IP work is authentic; the introduction of smart contracts makes transaction settlements more transparent, copyright revenue sharing more immediate, truly ensuring that creators continuously benefit from the secondary market. The support of cross-chain trading technology further broadens the scope of IP commodity circulation, enhancing the global liquidity of IP assets. Lastly, in the IP community operation process, VIRTUAL MIND constructs high-interaction fan communities through loyalty programs and co-creation activities, effectively enhancing user stickiness and long-term brand value. Fans can participate in collective creations through online platforms like Club App, while offline physical venues and pop-up spaces extend virtual storytelling to real-life settings, seamlessly integrating digital collections and physical experiences. In this process, AI data analysis continually optimizes interaction strategies, making each touchpoint more precise and engaging. Taking the sports IP project that the company cooperates with WestFoot Chain Technology as an example, they will jointly launch derivative products such as co-branded apparel, collectible figurines, player cards of well-known sports IPs, while leveraging Web3 and AI technology to develop virtual rights and digital experiences, such as releasing exclusive digital content, setting up interactive voting and rights systems, and developing AR tour guides. At the same time, all digital collectibles support global compliant resale, and rights holders can continuously share in the secondary market profits through smart contracts, truly realizing the long-term symbiosis of IP value. Smart Manufacturing: Facilitating industrial upgrading and global deployment As the other pole of the "dual-drive" strategy, VIRTUAL MIND's smart manufacturing business is extending the company's consumer-level IP business to broader industrial scenarios, enabling Chinese enterprises to connect with the global intelligent industry and driving the transformation and upgrading of traditional manufacturing towards intelligence, opening up a second growth curve. In September 2025, the company reached a strategic cooperation agreement with Iflytek Co.,ltd., and the Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources of Saudi Arabia, marking an important milestone in this strategic layout. According to the agreement, VIRTUAL MIND will integrate leading domestic resources in Siasun Robot & Automation and the automation industry chain to provide Saudi Arabia with comprehensive solutions from technology introduction, automation transformation to industrial ecosystem construction. This includes jointly establishing the intelligent Siasun Robot & Automation training ground and pilot platform with Iflytek Co.,ltd., building an artificial intelligence industry platform, exploring Siasun Robot & Automation super-brain technology applications, and promoting the construction of AI + intelligent industrial application scenarios. While empowering industrial upgrading, the company also plans to assist Saudi Arabia in innovatively exploring the Real-World Asset (RWA) financing model, providing sustainable funding solutions for major projects such as smart factories and intelligent manufacturing bases in Saudi Arabia. In the future, the two parties also plan to deepen cooperation in the field of industrial city infrastructure, jointly building a global "smart manufacturing super complex". These moves are highly aligned with Saudi Arabia's "2030 Vision": recently, the Saudi government officially reaffirmed its industrial development strategy, setting a goal to increase the share of manufacturing industry in GDP from the current about 13% to 20% by 2030. Meanwhile, the Saudi Public Investment Fund has identified advanced manufacturing and digital infrastructure as key investment areas, putting all efforts into promoting the deep integration of local industry chains with technologies such as artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things. By extending digital technology capabilities from consumer scenarios to manufacturing fields, VIRTUAL MIND is steadily advancing its business layout in this new track of smart manufacturing, creating more expansive development space for the future. Collaborative strategy of "dual-drive" for long-term development The successful practice in smart consumption has laid a solid foundation for the company's extension to the industrial side. The blockchain-based rights certification, digital IP trading, and community operation capabilities accumulated in the consumer end are gradually transforming into competitive advantages in the industrial domain: on one hand, the technology architecture based on IP digitalization can be directly applied to industrial intellectual property protection and management; on the other hand, smart contracts and cross-border settlement systems provide mature technical solutions for cross-border cooperation in the manufacturing industry. Additionally, VIRTUAL MIND's unique Veye authentication system seamlessly integrates customer identity verification (KYC) and decentralized identity (DID), ensuring the authenticity, compliance, and trustworthiness of online identities in both Web2 and Web3 environments; by advancing the deep integration of artificial intelligence and blockchain, smart, data-driven infrastructure is developed to continuously improve automation levels, fraud detection capabilities, and personalized user experiences in real-time. Currently, the company has a strong world-class team, with 100% of the technical team members from the top 20 universities in the QS World University Rankings, all holding master's degrees or higher, possessing deep expertise in blockchain, artificial intelligence, and compliance fields. Under the "dual-drive" strategy of smart consumption and smart manufacturing, VIRTUAL MIND has established a differentiated competitive advantage different from single-track enterprises. Looking ahead, the company is poised to continue capturing structural growth opportunities in the dual trend of IP digitization and global manufacturing industry intelligence transformation, achieving a dual improvement in performance and valuation.