<div id="readability-page-1">ByteDance’s Volcano Engine, the cloud unit that released an OpenClaw-based cloud agent tool ArkClaw, is betting that the next phase of artificial intelligence will hinge on cheaper tokens, higher inference efficiency and longer context windows. “Agent-related token consumption still accounts for a single-digit percentage of total token usage, but it is growing,” said Li Guodong, chief architect of ArkClaw, on Tuesday on the sidelines of OpenClaw’s first mainland China event since the open-source agent framework went viral globally earlier this year, triggering a wave of “lobster” enthusiasm among Chinese developers. The nickname lobster comes from the AI tool’s logo. Although some of the initial hype around OpenClaw has eased, the Shanghai event was packed with about 1,300 attendees, according to the organiser, the Mu, a global builder community that was forced to restrict entry at one point. Attendees wore claw-themed headgear and gathered around demos and keynotes. Volcano Engine began developing agent-relevant products last year and reached out to OpenClaw soon after the project gained traction during the Chinese New Year holiday, Li said. In March, it launched ArkClaw, a cloud version of OpenClaw that Li likened to turning MySQL – a widely used open-source database – into a service. In April, the two sides co-launched the China mirror site for ClawHub, OpenClaw’s skills marketplace.  Token demand is already climbing amid rapid adoption and advances in multimodal models. As of March, daily average token usage of ByteDance’s Doubao large language models had surpassed 120 trillion, doubling in three months and rising more than 1,000-fold from their May 2024 launch, according to Volcano Engine. Separate data from market research firm IDC showed China’s enterprise model-as-a-service market saw 1.944 quadrillion tokens processed on public clouds in 2025, up 16-fold year on year, with Volcano Engine ranked first with a 49.5 per cent market share. Li said models were evolving in two directions that were particularly important for the agent era – reducing inference costs and extending context windows – and Volcano Engine had been reducing token costs through algorithmic optimisation and resource scheduling. He said the industry was seeking to balance more affordable tokens with the need to build sustainable businesses. ArkClaw is sold as a monthly subscription, priced from 29 yuan (US$4.25) to 99 yuan. Cut off from Nvidia’s offerings, Chinese large language model developers are accelerating the adoption of domestic alternatives. DeepSeek’s latest V4 model has become a recent example of that shift through its collaboration with Huawei’s Ascend chips. It said V4 would face throughput constraints until the second half of the year, when Huawei’s Ascend 950PR supernodes were expected to “ship at scale”. ByteDance has lifted planned AI infrastructure spending this year to more than 200 billion yuan, at least 25 per cent above an earlier proposal of 160 billion yuan, the South China Morning Post previously reported. A larger share is expected to go to domestic AI chips. Common uses of ArkClaw now included media generation for gaming companies, office productivity and coding, Li said. For enterprises, one key challenge was identity and configuration management, Li said, as agents needed controlled access to downstream services and sensitive data before they could work across corporate systems. “ByteDance is always the first client of its own product,” Li said. ByteClaw, an internal agent tool connected to the company’s own systems, has been widely adopted by employees, with multiple agents handling workplace tasks. In those workflows, developers are moving from writing code to setting goals and reviewing. This week, Volcano Engine also launched Ark Agent Plan, a broader subscription package that supports ByteDance’s in-house Seed series models as well as models from Zhipu and Moonshot AI. The plan works with coding and agent platforms including Claude Code, OpenCode, Trae, OpenClaw and Hermes Agent, and also includes ArkClaw. The package offers four tiers, ranging from 40 yuan to 1,000 yuan a month. It uses “Agent Fuel Points” as a unified unit for measuring agent resource consumption, allowing users to track usage in real time.</div>

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<p>ByteDance's Volcano Engine is leveraging the OpenClaw AI framework to develop profitable cloud-based tools like ArkClaw, focusing on cost-effective tokens and improved efficiency. Despite initial hype waning, a recent event attracted 1,300 attendees. The company plans to invest over 200 billion yuan in AI infrastructure, emphasizing domestic chip alternatives. ArkClaw, priced between 29 to 99 yuan monthly, is used for media generation and productivity. New subscription packages, including Ark Agent Plan, support various AI models and allow real-time tracking of resource consumption.</p>

How ByteDance plans to turn OpenClaw craze into a profitable AI business