Originally published on newsroom.marykay.com

We Believe In Women Before They Believe In Themselves
Mary Kay Ash built her iconic company on a dream to enrich women’s lives around the world. What began in 1963 as a small act of courage has become a timeless beauty brand built on purpose, transforming lives and igniting self-growth. Today, Mary Kay stands as a beacon of women’s empowerment, operating in 40 markets worldwide and recognized as one of the world’s most beloved consumer brands.

A Business With Purpose At Its Heart
For more than 60 years, the Mary Kay selling opportunity has been at the heart of everything we do. We believe every woman deserves the chance to build something of her own, on her own terms. Through direct selling, we are proud to foster a low-risk pathway to independent entrepreneurship that evolves with the needs of women and consumers at every stage of their lives.

The Mary Kay opportunity empowers women around the world to build their business on their own terms, selling high-quality Mary Kay® products, sharing beauty and confidence within their communities, and earning a supplemental income with flexibility. Each Independent Beauty Consultant is a small business owner who turns passion into purpose and purpose into possibility.

When you buy from a Mary Kay Independent Beauty Consultant, you’re supporting a local women-led business, and the families and communities that thrive because of it. Mary Kay Ash said it best: “Nothing happens unless somebody sells something.” That simple truth still powers everything we do and remains the foundation of our business, guided by the highest standards of ethics and integrity.

A Community Built On Connection
Our community of Independent Beauty Consultants (IBCs) around the world is as diverse as the goals that fuel it. They know that with the Mary Kay opportunity they are “in business for themselves, but not by themselves.” We equip them with education, mentorship, and digital tools to meet customers where they are, while keeping the human touch that defines us. Our commitment to their personal and professional growth has changed the trajectory for millions of women who, in turn, have made a profound impact on their families and communities around the world.

A Legacy Of Innovation And Impact
Mary Kay is still family-owned and family-led, a rare distinction in today’s world and a reflection of our long-term commitment to building a business that uplifts people, evolves, and delivers lasting value. Purpose infuses everything we do; it’s the thread connecting our powerful brand, our legacy and the next generation of IBCs and consumers who seek entrepreneurial opportunities and products that align with their lives and aspirations.

Countless stories underscore the transformative power of what we do and what we offer. Learn more here.

Did You Know:

  • 6.2 million Americans are engaged in direct selling[1].
  • 73% of direct sellers in the U.S. are women[2].
  • In the U.S. direct selling has achieved 34.7 billion in retail sells in 2024[3].
  • 30% of Sales Force members who started a Mary Kay Business in 2024 are under the age of 35[4].

Recent Recognition and Impact Data:

  • #1 Direct Selling Brand of Skincare and Color Cosmetics in the World by Euromonitor International[5] in 2023, 2024 and again in 2025.
  • Ranked #8 on Forbes 2026 Best Brands for Social Impact list. Mary Kay is the only beauty brand, only direct selling brand in the Top 10.
  • Ranked #2 on Forbes 2026 Best Customer Service list.
  • Ranked #11 in the Women’s Wear Daily 2024 Top 100 of Beauty Companies (2025).
  • Newsweek gave us a Five Stars rating for Newsweek’s America’s Greatest Workplaces for Women in 2025 and again in 2026.
  • Earned The “Large Corporation of the Year” 2026 Award from the Dallas Entrepreneurship Center (DEC) Network State of Entrepreneurship.
  • 1,200+ patents globally held by Mary Kay for products, technologies, and packaging designs in its portfolio, which displays our dedication to innovation.
  • $230 Million donated in monetary and in-kind donations globally since 1996 to support victims of domestic violence and research on cancers affecting women.
  • 37 grants awarded to young women pursuing STEM dreams.
  • 38 years of work in partnership with The Nature Conservancy, 17 years with the Arbor Day Foundation.

***

About Mary Kay

One of the original glass ceiling breakers, Mary Kay Ash founded her dream beauty brand in Texas in 1963 with one goal: to enrich women’s lives. Learn more at marykayglobal.com. Find us on FacebookInstagram, and LinkedIn, or follow us on X.

###
 

[1] 2025 DSEF Growth & Outlook Report.

[2] U.S. Direct Selling Association.

[3] U.S. Direct Selling Association

[4] Source: Mary Kay Inc. 2024 U.S. data.

[5] Source: Euromonitor International Limited; Beauty and Personal Care 2023 Edition, value sales at RSP, 2022, 2023 and 2024 data.

Complimentary Webinar:

SQF Edition 10: Updates & Change Management Process

Tuesday, April 28, 2026, 9:00 AM PST (12:00 PM EST)

REGISTER HERE

What’s changing in SQF Edition 10 — and what does it mean for your team?

Join this live session from SCS Global Services for a clear, practical overview of the most important updates, including new expectations around food safety culture and the revised assessment scoring approach.

You’ll walk away with:

  • A breakdown of key SQF Edition 10 changes
  • Insight into how scoring updates may impact your audit outcomes
  • Practical steps to support implementation
  • A structured approach to managing change across your organization

Whether you’re just starting to review the new code or actively planning your transition, this session will help you move forward with clarity.

Can’t make it live? Register anyway – all attendees get access to the recording.
 

REGISTER NOW

 

For inquiries, contact:

Shyama Devarajan 
Senior Marketing Analyst, SCS Global Services 
sdevarajan@scsglobalservices.com

VANCOUVER, BC, April 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ – Ballard Power Systems (NASDAQ: BLDP) (TSX: BLDP) today welcomed Ralph Robinett as Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, replacing Lee Sweetland, effective April 13th, 2026.

Ralph brings more than 25 years of global operations, manufacturing, supply chain, and transformation leadership experience across advanced technology and clean energy businesses. He has led large-scale operational organizations, built and expanded manufacturing facilities in multiple regions, driven cost reduction and productivity improvement initiatives, and helped commercialize innovative technologies at scale.

Most recently, Ralph served as Chief Operating Officer at GAF Energy, where he led manufacturing, supply chain, new product deployment, factory expansions, and automation design for the company’s rapidly growing solar roof business. Through his leadership, he helped grow output and revenue, led deployment of an automated solar shingle manufacturing plant, and supported commercialization of GAF Energy’s second-generation product.

Ralph has also held senior leadership positions at Celestica, Velodyne LiDAR, and SunPower, where he oversaw international manufacturing, implementation of automation strategy, and supply chain transformation.

“We are pleased to welcome Ralph to Ballard as our new Chief Operating Officer,” said Marty Neese, Ballard’s President and CEO. “Ralph brings a powerful combination of operational discipline, global manufacturing expertise, and strategic leadership to the position. His track record of scaling complex operations, improving productivity, and building strong teams will be invaluable as we continue to execute on our strategy and position Ballard for long-term growth. I also want to thank Lee Sweetland for his contributions to Ballard and wish him well in the future.”

“I am honored to join Ballard as Chief Operating Officer,” said Ralph Robinett. “Ballard has a strong foundation, a talented team, and an important role to play in the advancement of clean energy solutions. I look forward to working closely with the team to strengthen operations, support customers, and help drive the company’s next phase of growth.”

About Ballard Power Systems

Ballard Power Systems’ (NASDAQ: BLDP; TSX: BLDP) vision is to deliver fuel cell power for a sustainable planet. Ballard zero-emission PEM fuel cells enable electrification of mobility, including buses, commercial trucks, trains, marine vessels, and stationary power. To learn more about Ballard, please visit www.ballard.com.

This release contains forward-looking statements concerning anticipated impacts of the announced leadership change. These forward-looking statements reflect Ballard’s current expectations as contemplated under section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Any such forward-looking statements are based on Ballard’s assumptions relating to its financial forecasts and expectations regarding its product development efforts, manufacturing capacity, and market demand.

These statements involve risks and uncertainties that may cause Ballard’s actual results to be materially different, including general economic and regulatory changes, detrimental reliance on third parties, successfully achieving our business plans and achieving and sustaining profitability. For a detailed discussion of these and other risk factors that could affect Ballard’s future performance, please refer to Ballard’s most recent Annual Information Form. Readers should not place undue reliance on Ballard’s forward-looking statements and Ballard assumes no obligation to update or release any revisions to these forward-looking statements, other than as required under applicable legislation.

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SOURCE Ballard Power Systems Inc.

The HelloNation Athlete Program compensates student-athletes to tell their hometown stories and opens the door to a career in media

BEDFORD, Texas, April 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — HelloNation and Opendorse today announced a partnership to launch the HelloNation Athlete Program, a national NIL initiative that pays college athletes to create short-form video content spotlighting the people, places, and stories that define their hometowns. The agreement, signed March 5, 2026, designates HelloNation as the Launch Partner of the offering; the first program of its kind on the Opendorse platform.

At the center of the program is actor Chris McDonald, widely recognized as Shooter McGavin from Happy Gilmore, who serves as HelloNation’s national spokesman. McDonald personally invites athletes into the program, framing the opportunity not as a side gig but as the beginning of a career in broadcast media. “HelloNation has over 30,000 opportunities nationwide,” McDonald tells athletes in his welcome message. “We’re actively building out a team of content creators, field correspondents, and brand ambassadors. This is your portfolio. This is your first byline.”

Through the Opendorse platform, including over 225 direct athletic department partnerships, participating athletes receive formal NIL deals and are paid to complete a series of themed video assignments, called Quests, focused on their hometown communities. Topics include memorable teachers and mentors, local small businesses, and the qualities that make their hometowns worth celebrating. Videos run 45 to 90 seconds and are evaluated on communication clarity, storytelling, authenticity, and professionalism, with scores contributing to a national leaderboard.

HelloNation built this program to be more than a one-time NIL deal. Athletes who demonstrate strong performance will be considered for internships and full-time roles within HelloNation’s growing national media network, which spans community-focused digital publications in markets nationwide and is supported by partnerships with the National Governors Association, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and the United States First Responders Association. The program is designed to serve as a structured pipeline: athletes earn NIL compensation, build an on-camera portfolio, and open the door to careers in community journalism and media.

“We’re coming to these athletes at exactly the right time,” said Bob Bartosiewicz, CEO of HelloNation. “The job market is shifting fast, and human-essential skills: storytelling, community connection, showing up and doing the work, are exactly what HelloNation is built around. This program gives student-athletes a real NIL opportunity today and a genuine career path for tomorrow. We’re not looking for one video. We’re looking for the next wave of broadcasters, and we believe we’re going to find them.”

Opendorse will support the program through athlete outreach, deal creation, payment processing, tax documentation, disclosure compliance, and campaign administration. The platform will also promote HelloNation to its network of more than 175,000 college athletes through email campaigns, in-app notifications, and athlete-facing content.

“Student-athletes are heroes and role models, not only in their college towns, but their hometowns as well, and their presence is strong as they inspire the next generation,” said Steven Denton, CEO of Opendorse. “Their stories and perspectives are unique. The HelloNation Athlete Program is a great way to tap into athlete influence at scale and create significant value for all parties: athletes, advertisers, and communities. We’re proud to help bring this vision to life and look forward to thousands of unique athlete features.”

For communities, the model is built on authenticity. College athletes are uniquely positioned to speak about the places where they grew up; the businesses, teachers, and traditions that shaped them. HelloNation’s network publishes community-focused content in neighborhood-level digital magazines across every market in the country, giving athletes a platform that extends well beyond social media.

As the program expands, HelloNation and Opendorse plan to introduce monthly career-focused events, including live sessions with guest speakers from media, sports, and business, exclusively available to program participants. The long-term vision is a nationwide network of athlete storytellers who have earned their way into HelloNation’s media ecosystem and are building careers from the communities that made them.

About HelloNation
HelloNation is America’s Good News Network, a premier media platform built on the idea that good news travels faster when real people tell real stories. Through its community-focused digital publications and innovative “edvertising” approach, HelloNation delivers expert-driven, good-news content that informs, inspires, and spotlights the leaders making a meaningful impact in their communities. HelloNation maintains partnerships with the National Governors Association, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and the United States First Responders Association.

About Opendorse
Opendorse is a leading NIL technology, data, and services company that helps athletes, schools, collectives, brands, and other organizations activate and manage name, image, and likeness opportunities through compliant, scalable solutions. Opendorse supports a network of more than 175,000 college athletes across all divisions and sports. 

www.hellonation.com

 

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SOURCE HelloNation

Project Expected to Provide Mitigation Credits for 14-County Area

LONGVIEW, Texas, April 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Mitigation Resources of North America® today announced the acquisition of 958 acres in Wilson County, Tennessee, located east of Nashville, marking a significant expansion into an area experiencing steady economic growth. This project is expected to deliver a new mitigation bank with high-quality stream and wetland mitigation credits. These credits will support continued residential, industrial and infrastructure development around greater Nashville in a 14-county area – double the typical service range for similar mitigation projects.  

Mitigation Resources of North America expects its mitigation bank to deliver significant value across the region and help balance unavoidable environmental impacts from regional development projects. Mitigation banking creates a simple, responsible way to support both progress and environmental stewardship, delivering benefits that will last for generations.

“Securing this property is a transformative moment for the growth and development of our organization,” said Eric Anderson, President of Mitigation Resources of North America. “This market has tremendous growth, and along with it, a significant demand for stream credits that will contribute to future profitability.”

Mitigation Resources will immediately begin restoration planning and coordinating regulatory approvals, with initial credit availability anticipated in 2029.

“This is just the beginning,” Anderson said. “We’re proud to take this important step forward and excited about the lasting impact this project will have for decades to come. This project aligns with our strategy of building a portfolio of mitigation assets in high-growth regions that can deliver mitigation solutions to our customers.”

About Mitigation Resources of North America

Mitigation Resources of North America® provides a range of ecological restoration services as a business within NACCO Natural Resources, a subsidiary of NACCO Industries® (NYSE:NC).  More information can be found at www.mitigate.pro

About NACCO Industries

NACCO Industries® brings natural resources to life by delivering aggregates, minerals, reliable fuels and environmental solutions through its robust portfolio of NACCO Natural Resources® businesses. Learn more about our companies at nacco.com or get investor information at ir.nacco.com.

Mitigation Resources logo

 

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SOURCE Mitigation Resources of North America and NACCO Industries

Cities, developers and investors need to move beyond a shortterm project-delivery perspective and focus on social and financial value that lasts for generations. In a new report, Skanska finds that cities that focus on shortterm performance risk undermining resilience, competitiveness and longterm economic value.

NEW YORK, April 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ –The report, Shaping Sustainable Places, points to a growing need to manage risk, protect investment value and meet rising societal expectations. It calls for stakeholders to close the gap between the way urban projects in Europe and the USA are delivered and how places are expected to perform over time.

“Urban development is entering a decisive new phase,” says Claes Larsson, EVP Skanska Group, Commercial Property Development and Investment Properties. “Success today is about creating resilient places that can adapt, endure and continue to deliver real value for people, climate and business long after construction is finished.”

Four actions are identified to secure cities’ long-term prospects: 

  • Design for change. Adaptable, resilient design protects asset value, reduces future retrofit costs and strengthens long–term competitiveness.
  • Work together. Early alignment and shared stewardship between stakeholders improve predictability and long–term performance.
  • Design for and with people. Early engagement with the local society reduces delays, strengthens demand and supports stable occupancy.
  • Measure what matters. Integrating social, environmental and economic indicators leads to better decisions and stronger long–term outcomes.

“Investors, insurers and central banks are increasingly integrating climate risks into their processes. Buildings cannot be moved, they must be adaptable to safeguard their future value,” says Lena Hök, EVP Sustainability & Innovation, Skanska Group. “As climate risk is priced into markets, insurance and regulation, value will increasingly follow those who design for change, collaborate early, plan with people and measure what matters, so buildings and districts stay resilient.”

The report targets decision-makers and investors who are committed to creating enduring value in cities and urban environments.

Download the full report and associated material here: www.skanska.com

For further information please contact:
Jacob Birkeland, Head of Media Relation and Public Affairs, Skanska Group,
tel +46 (0)10 449 04 94
Direct line for media, tel +46 (0)10 448 88 99

This and previous releases can also be found at www.skanska.com.

Skanska Group uses its knowledge and foresight to shape the way people live, work, and connect. We are one of the world’s largest construction and project development companies, with 2025 revenue totaling SEK 179 billion. We operate across select markets in the Nordics, Europe and USA. Together with our customers and the collective expertise of our 26,000 teammates, we create innovative and sustainable solutions that support healthy living beyond our lifetime.

Photo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2953845/Skanska_US.jpg
Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2953875/Skanska_Logo.jpg

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SOURCE Skanska

From VoiceAgent to WiseNote to the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees,” Bairong is showcasing not just individual AI features, but a comprehensive, enterprise-grade practice that truly integrates AI into roles, processes, and management systems. Following its previous inclusions in Harvard Business School case studies, Bairong is now entering global frontier discussions with innovative solutions such as “AI employees” and “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance.”

BEIJING, April 12, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — On March 30, Tsedal Neeley, Senior Associate Dean and Chair of the MBA program at Harvard Business School, specifically paid her visit to Bairong Intelligence. During this visit, the two sides engaged in in-depth exchanges on the progress of AI applications, explored the systemic transformation in the AI era, and discussed the commercial practices of “silicon-carbon co-governance.”

At Bairong, Professor Neeley experienced VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees” firsthand, witnessing a real-world example: AI is no longer just answering questions or assisting with work—it is undertaking tasks in real business operations, embedding into processes, accepting performance evaluations, and becoming manageable, collaborative, and sustainably evolving into “silicon-based employees ” under human supervision.

Previously, the firm was selected as one of the flagship Chinese corporate examples in HBS’s case library for its pioneering work in machine learning and decision intelligence. This time, however, Bairong presents an even more cutting-edge and revolutionary topic: the pivot from “AI as a tool” to “AI as the workforce”, and from tactical technology deployment to strategic organizational restructuring.

From “Able to Answer” to “Capable of Working”: Bairong Demonstrates a Complete Company AI Practice

At the beginning of the visit, Professor Neeley experienced Bairong’s VoiceAgent. Faced with multi-turn, multi-scenario, multi-language voice interactions and complex business Q&A, this “silicon-based employee” demonstrated natural, fluent, and professional communication capabilities. From continuous semantic understanding to personalized demand feedback, and from frontline business consulting to complex service scenario responses—the entire interaction process moved beyond the basic “voice assistant” level of Q&A, resembling a true business role capable of undertaking service tasks. Professor Neeley expressed amazement multiple times during the on-site visit, highly praising its naturalness and professionalism. Bairong VoiceAgent is built on the self-developed BR-Voice end-to-end large model, focusing on breaking through the mechanical and fragmented limitations of traditional voice interactions to achieve a natural interaction experience closer to real business environments.

Professor Neeley also experienced WiseNote, an expertise-driven “silicon-based employee.” Unlike the common perception of AI as merely “writing summaries and providing assistance,” WiseNote demonstrates a markedly expanded scope of capabilities. Under natural language instructions, it autonomously integrates and analyzes multi-source heterogeneous data, extracts core trends, constructs logical frameworks, and generates deep insights—producing comprehensive reports grounded in data, professional analysis, and strategic judgment within a short timeframe. After reviewing the in-depth industry report generated by WiseNote, Professor Neeley felt it was no longer simple AI assistance, but closer to an AI expert capable of independently completing high-quality knowledge work. WiseNote represents that AI beginning to possess “standalone” position value in professional knowledge work.

What triggered her organizational-level thinking most was the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees.” In this system, Professor Neeley see a complete management system oriented toward silicon-based employees. Every silicon-based employee has an exclusive employee number, email, position, training records, performance ratings, and transfer and promotion records, reporting directly to a clear carbon-based business supervisor. From “onboarding applications” and “position configuration” to “performance evaluation” and “personnel changes,” there are standardized processes and system support. More importantly, Bairong is not just conceptually proposing “that AI become employees,” but has already applied human resource management, organizational management, and performance mechanisms to the daily operations of its silicon-based employees.

What Bairong Truly Answers is Not Just a Product Question, but an Organizational Question in the AI Era

Following the product experience, Zhang Shaofeng, CEO of the company, led the Bairong team in an in-depth closed-door exchange with Professor Neeley, focusing on technology, business strategy, and organizational practices. Bairong systematically reviewed its long-term deployment of AI Agents, starting in 2014 with “silicon-based risk control employees,” and later in 2017, after the emergence of the Transformer architecture, deploying voice large language models and silicon-based customer service and sales agents. The Company has gradually evolved from MaaS (Model as a Service) and BaaS (Business as a Service) to a result-oriented RaaS (Results as a Service) model, and after 2023, achieved multi-industry, multi-role silicon-based employee coverage. Therefore, what Bairong demonstrates today is not a superficial stacking of short-term trending topics, but organizational practices evolved over more than a decade around “making AI become employees.”

At the technical level, Bairong demonstrated its key capabilities covering layers 3-5 of the AI ecosystem: the self-developed BR-LLM-Proactive domain large model, BR-Voice end-to-end voice model, BR-Vision visual large model, and BR-Next Voice next-generation voice model, achieving rapid Agent construction and operation through AgentOS Baigong, and multi-scenario, multi-role large-scale deployment through AgentStore Baihui.

The value of these numbers is not just to illustrate that “Bairong made products,” but to show that Bairong has already pushed AI from the functional layer to the position layer, and from single-point tools to organizational operational units. Traditional organizations often rely on carbon-based employees as “APIs” between systems, undertaking large amounts of cross-system coordination and repetitive work. While in AI-native organizations, silicon-based employees begin to undertake end-to-end process orchestration and automated execution, allowing carbon-based employees to focus more on strategy, judgment, innovation, and decision-making. The change in AI is not just a technological change, but an organizational design change.

From “AI Tools” to “AI Employees,” “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” Creates New Value Propositions for Future Organizations

In the exchange, the “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” concept proposed by Bairong became the part that resonated most deeply with both sides. Professor Neeley pointed out that past academic research on AI applications in enterprises mostly remained at the level of “tools assisting humans.” However, Bairong’s practice, especially the combined demonstration of VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees,” allowed her to see a clear leap from “AI tools” to “AI employees.” Silicon-based employees begin to undertake standardized, repetitive, and process-driven operational tasks, while also entering into professional work such as deep analysis and report writing. Meanwhile, carbon-based employees are released from large amounts of tedious affairs, focusing more on strategic judgment, innovation and creation, risk control, and emotional value delivery. Professor Neeley believes this is not a simple replacement, but a new division of labor structure, a new collaborative model, and a governance framework worthy of continuous attention from global enterprise management research.

This view is highly consistent with Bairong’s long-term core philosophy. Bairong believes that company transformation in the AI era is never about simple software upgrades or efficiency tool introductions, but the deep restructuring of organizational models “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” is not only Bairong’s internal organizational practice, but also a methodology for AI transformation facing global companies. Therefore, in its own operations, Bairong does not treat silicon-based employees as “plug-in tools,” but as collaborators, executors, and result bearers in real positions, ensuring they operate stably and iterate continuously under human supervision through systematic management.

This is also the true difference between Bairong and many AI companies that only remain at the demo or single-point function level. What Bairong proposes and practices is not “smarter tools,” but “new types of employees that can be absorbed by organizations.” It is not about “local efficiency improvement,” but about “rewriting company operations around positions, processes, governance, and results.” This makes Bairong’s exploration naturally possess research and demonstration value beyond the product itself.

From Chinese Practice to Global Context: Bairong is Becoming a Benchmark of Next-Generation Enterprise AI

As a long-term practitioner in the AI Agent field, Bairong has formed a silicon-based employee matrix covering nearly 200 positions, with deployed scenarios spanning finance, telecommunications, retail, enterprise services, and other industries, and has received attention and recognition from international research institutions such as IDC and Gartner. Within Bairong, silicon-based employee management has also become part of daily operations. Its presentation materials show that Bairong has received market attention in multiple dimensions including domain large models, Agent Builder, finance, marketing and sales, human resources, and legal affairs. The Company has seen multiple RaaS cases incorporated into Gartner-related research, and has also become one of the co-leads of the AI Agent ecosystem working group.

In the future, Bairong will continue to evolve around domain large models and core AI Agent capabilities, continuously optimizing core products such as VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees.” The Company will continuously enrich the position roles and application scenarios of silicon-based employees, promoting them to more widely enter enterprise business practices. Bairong will also continue to transform its long-term exploration in “making AI become employees” into methods and samples that can be discussed, researched, and referenced by the global industry, academia, and business communities.

About Bairong

Bairong AI Inc. (6608.HK) is a leading pioneer in enterprise AI agent solutions. Guided by the mission of “Empowering Every Industry and Home with AI,” it delivers its services through a Result-as-a-Service (RaaS) model, providing institutional clients with tailored AI agent capabilities. At the core of Bairong’s technology stack are its proprietary BR-LLM large language model and the “Bairong CybotStar百融百工” enterprise AI agent operating system, which empower clients to build and deploy their own custom AI agents. Bairong also delivers end-to-end business outcomes via business process outsourcing and position outsourcing services.

To date, Bairong has served over 8,000 institutional clients while maintaining a core client retention rate of 98%. Its clients span diverse sectors including internet, retail, communications, education, healthcare, and more. The company’s solutions address a comprehensive range of use cases: marketing recommendation and sales collaboration, intelligent customer service and outbound calls, contract/bill and regulation analysis, credit approval and anti-fraud, claims settlement and archive management, as well as recruitment operation and training empowerment. Bairong holds over 95% independent intellectual property rights for its products, with a cumulative portfolio of more than 573 patents and software copyrights.

Recognized as a leading innovator in China’s next-generation technology sector, Bairong has earned significant industry acclaim. The company was named one of the “China Top 60 AI Enterprises” in Morgan Stanley’s industry analysis and has been highlighted in annual reports by Kai Yuan and Ping An Securities Technology Team. In IDC’s evaluations, Bairong consistently ranks as a leader across multiple dimensions for large language models and intelligent agents. Furthermore, the company holds the industry’s highest rating for Corporate Governance in MSCI’s ESG assessments.

For more information, please visit: http://ir.brgroup.com 

Safe Harbor Statement

This press release contains statements that may constitute “forward-looking” statements. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminologies such as “will,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “aims,” “future,” “intends,” “plans,” “believes,” “estimates,” “likely to,” and the negative of these words and other similar expressions or statements. Bairong may also make written or oral forward-looking statements in its periodic reports to the HKEx, in its annual and interim reports to shareholders, in press releases and other written materials, and in oral statements made by its officers, directors, or employees to third parties. Statements that are not historical facts, including statements about Bairong’s beliefs, plans, and expectations, are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statements, including but not limited to the following: Bairong’s strategies, future business development, and financial condition and results of operations; Bairong’s limited operating history; risks associated with the financial service industry, Bairong’s ability to develop and deliver services of high quality and appeal to clients; Bairong’s ability to generate positive cash flow and profits; Bairong’s ability to compete successfully; Bairong’s ability to build its brand and withstand negative publicity; and changes in client demand and government incentives, subsidies, or other favorable government policies. Further information regarding these and other risks is included in Bairong’s filings with the HKEX. All information provided in this press release is as of the date of this press release, and Bairong does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements, except as required under applicable laws.

 

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SOURCE Bairong Inc.

From VoiceAgent to WiseNote to the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees,” Bairong is showcasing not just individual AI features, but a comprehensive, enterprise-grade practice that truly integrates AI into roles, processes, and management systems. Following its previous inclusions in Harvard Business School case studies, Bairong is now entering global frontier discussions with innovative solutions such as “AI employees” and “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance.”

BEIJING, April 12, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — On March 30, Tsedal Neeley, Senior Associate Dean and Chair of the MBA program at Harvard Business School, specifically paid her visit to Bairong Intelligence. During this visit, the two sides engaged in in-depth exchanges on the progress of AI applications, explored the systemic transformation in the AI era, and discussed the commercial practices of “silicon-carbon co-governance.”

At Bairong, Professor Neeley experienced VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees” firsthand, witnessing a real-world example: AI is no longer just answering questions or assisting with work—it is undertaking tasks in real business operations, embedding into processes, accepting performance evaluations, and becoming manageable, collaborative, and sustainably evolving into “silicon-based employees ” under human supervision.

Previously, the firm was selected as one of the flagship Chinese corporate examples in HBS’s case library for its pioneering work in machine learning and decision intelligence. This time, however, Bairong presents an even more cutting-edge and revolutionary topic: the pivot from “AI as a tool” to “AI as the workforce”, and from tactical technology deployment to strategic organizational restructuring.

From “Able to Answer” to “Capable of Working”: Bairong Demonstrates a Complete Company AI Practice

At the beginning of the visit, Professor Neeley experienced Bairong’s VoiceAgent. Faced with multi-turn, multi-scenario, multi-language voice interactions and complex business Q&A, this “silicon-based employee” demonstrated natural, fluent, and professional communication capabilities. From continuous semantic understanding to personalized demand feedback, and from frontline business consulting to complex service scenario responses—the entire interaction process moved beyond the basic “voice assistant” level of Q&A, resembling a true business role capable of undertaking service tasks. Professor Neeley expressed amazement multiple times during the on-site visit, highly praising its naturalness and professionalism. Bairong VoiceAgent is built on the self-developed BR-Voice end-to-end large model, focusing on breaking through the mechanical and fragmented limitations of traditional voice interactions to achieve a natural interaction experience closer to real business environments.

Professor Neeley also experienced WiseNote, an expertise-driven “silicon-based employee.” Unlike the common perception of AI as merely “writing summaries and providing assistance,” WiseNote demonstrates a markedly expanded scope of capabilities. Under natural language instructions, it autonomously integrates and analyzes multi-source heterogeneous data, extracts core trends, constructs logical frameworks, and generates deep insights—producing comprehensive reports grounded in data, professional analysis, and strategic judgment within a short timeframe. After reviewing the in-depth industry report generated by WiseNote, Professor Neeley felt it was no longer simple AI assistance, but closer to an AI expert capable of independently completing high-quality knowledge work. WiseNote represents that AI beginning to possess “standalone” position value in professional knowledge work.

What triggered her organizational-level thinking most was the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees.” In this system, Professor Neeley see a complete management system oriented toward silicon-based employees. Every silicon-based employee has an exclusive employee number, email, position, training records, performance ratings, and transfer and promotion records, reporting directly to a clear carbon-based business supervisor. From “onboarding applications” and “position configuration” to “performance evaluation” and “personnel changes,” there are standardized processes and system support. More importantly, Bairong is not just conceptually proposing “that AI become employees,” but has already applied human resource management, organizational management, and performance mechanisms to the daily operations of its silicon-based employees.

What Bairong Truly Answers is Not Just a Product Question, but an Organizational Question in the AI Era

Following the product experience, Zhang Shaofeng, CEO of the company, led the Bairong team in an in-depth closed-door exchange with Professor Neeley, focusing on technology, business strategy, and organizational practices. Bairong systematically reviewed its long-term deployment of AI Agents, starting in 2014 with “silicon-based risk control employees,” and later in 2017, after the emergence of the Transformer architecture, deploying voice large language models and silicon-based customer service and sales agents. The Company has gradually evolved from MaaS (Model as a Service) and BaaS (Business as a Service) to a result-oriented RaaS (Results as a Service) model, and after 2023, achieved multi-industry, multi-role silicon-based employee coverage. Therefore, what Bairong demonstrates today is not a superficial stacking of short-term trending topics, but organizational practices evolved over more than a decade around “making AI become employees.”

At the technical level, Bairong demonstrated its key capabilities covering layers 3-5 of the AI ecosystem: the self-developed BR-LLM-Proactive domain large model, BR-Voice end-to-end voice model, BR-Vision visual large model, and BR-Next Voice next-generation voice model, achieving rapid Agent construction and operation through AgentOS Baigong, and multi-scenario, multi-role large-scale deployment through AgentStore Baihui.

The value of these numbers is not just to illustrate that “Bairong made products,” but to show that Bairong has already pushed AI from the functional layer to the position layer, and from single-point tools to organizational operational units. Traditional organizations often rely on carbon-based employees as “APIs” between systems, undertaking large amounts of cross-system coordination and repetitive work. While in AI-native organizations, silicon-based employees begin to undertake end-to-end process orchestration and automated execution, allowing carbon-based employees to focus more on strategy, judgment, innovation, and decision-making. The change in AI is not just a technological change, but an organizational design change.

From “AI Tools” to “AI Employees,” “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” Creates New Value Propositions for Future Organizations

In the exchange, the “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” concept proposed by Bairong became the part that resonated most deeply with both sides. Professor Neeley pointed out that past academic research on AI applications in enterprises mostly remained at the level of “tools assisting humans.” However, Bairong’s practice, especially the combined demonstration of VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees,” allowed her to see a clear leap from “AI tools” to “AI employees.” Silicon-based employees begin to undertake standardized, repetitive, and process-driven operational tasks, while also entering into professional work such as deep analysis and report writing. Meanwhile, carbon-based employees are released from large amounts of tedious affairs, focusing more on strategic judgment, innovation and creation, risk control, and emotional value delivery. Professor Neeley believes this is not a simple replacement, but a new division of labor structure, a new collaborative model, and a governance framework worthy of continuous attention from global enterprise management research.

This view is highly consistent with Bairong’s long-term core philosophy. Bairong believes that company transformation in the AI era is never about simple software upgrades or efficiency tool introductions, but the deep restructuring of organizational models “Silicon-Carbon Co-Governance” is not only Bairong’s internal organizational practice, but also a methodology for AI transformation facing global companies. Therefore, in its own operations, Bairong does not treat silicon-based employees as “plug-in tools,” but as collaborators, executors, and result bearers in real positions, ensuring they operate stably and iterate continuously under human supervision through systematic management.

This is also the true difference between Bairong and many AI companies that only remain at the demo or single-point function level. What Bairong proposes and practices is not “smarter tools,” but “new types of employees that can be absorbed by organizations.” It is not about “local efficiency improvement,” but about “rewriting company operations around positions, processes, governance, and results.” This makes Bairong’s exploration naturally possess research and demonstration value beyond the product itself.

From Chinese Practice to Global Context: Bairong is Becoming a Benchmark of Next-Generation Enterprise AI

As a long-term practitioner in the AI Agent field, Bairong has formed a silicon-based employee matrix covering nearly 200 positions, with deployed scenarios spanning finance, telecommunications, retail, enterprise services, and other industries, and has received attention and recognition from international research institutions such as IDC and Gartner. Within Bairong, silicon-based employee management has also become part of daily operations. Its presentation materials show that Bairong has received market attention in multiple dimensions including domain large models, Agent Builder, finance, marketing and sales, human resources, and legal affairs. The Company has seen multiple RaaS cases incorporated into Gartner-related research, and has also become one of the co-leads of the AI Agent ecosystem working group.

In the future, Bairong will continue to evolve around domain large models and core AI Agent capabilities, continuously optimizing core products such as VoiceAgent, WiseNote, and the “Home for Silicon-Based Employees.” The Company will continuously enrich the position roles and application scenarios of silicon-based employees, promoting them to more widely enter enterprise business practices. Bairong will also continue to transform its long-term exploration in “making AI become employees” into methods and samples that can be discussed, researched, and referenced by the global industry, academia, and business communities.

About Bairong

Bairong AI Inc. (6608.HK) is a leading pioneer in enterprise AI agent solutions. Guided by the mission of “Empowering Every Industry and Home with AI,” it delivers its services through a Result-as-a-Service (RaaS) model, providing institutional clients with tailored AI agent capabilities. At the core of Bairong’s technology stack are its proprietary BR-LLM large language model and the “Bairong CybotStar百融百工” enterprise AI agent operating system, which empower clients to build and deploy their own custom AI agents. Bairong also delivers end-to-end business outcomes via business process outsourcing and position outsourcing services.

To date, Bairong has served over 8,000 institutional clients while maintaining a core client retention rate of 98%. Its clients span diverse sectors including internet, retail, communications, education, healthcare, and more. The company’s solutions address a comprehensive range of use cases: marketing recommendation and sales collaboration, intelligent customer service and outbound calls, contract/bill and regulation analysis, credit approval and anti-fraud, claims settlement and archive management, as well as recruitment operation and training empowerment. Bairong holds over 95% independent intellectual property rights for its products, with a cumulative portfolio of more than 573 patents and software copyrights.

Recognized as a leading innovator in China’s next-generation technology sector, Bairong has earned significant industry acclaim. The company was named one of the “China Top 60 AI Enterprises” in Morgan Stanley’s industry analysis and has been highlighted in annual reports by Kai Yuan and Ping An Securities Technology Team. In IDC’s evaluations, Bairong consistently ranks as a leader across multiple dimensions for large language models and intelligent agents. Furthermore, the company holds the industry’s highest rating for Corporate Governance in MSCI’s ESG assessments.

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SOURCE Bairong Inc.