On July 13, 2026, news surfaced suggesting that ByteDance was considering entering the autonomous driving arena, with a particular focus on unmanned logistics applications. This initiative was reportedly overseen by Zhou Chang's World Model Team, operating under Seed and aligned with the automotive industry sector of Volcano Engine. Despite ByteDance's official response, which emphasized that while they are actively engaged in numerous early-stage research and exploration projects within the realm of AI large models, including physical AI, they have no current plans to delve into the intelligent driving business. Nevertheless, some well-informed sources disclosed that the ByteDance team had previously engaged in business discussions and exchanges with several leading autonomous driving teams and had actively sought out and invited numerous top-tier talents specializing in assisted or autonomous driving to join their efforts.