On August 19, during Kuaishou’s Q2 2026 earnings call, the company’s founder and CEO Cheng Yixiao shared his outlook on AI’s transformative impact. He noted that AI is steadily driving down production costs and lowering the barrier to content creation, which in turn is fueling rapid growth in offerings like manhua dramas and short-form series. Kuaishou saw around 60,000 manhua drama episodes in 2025, and Cheng projects that number to skyrocket to 500,000 by 2026.