How do Chinese AI bots stack up against ChatGPT? We put them to the test

The heat is on as China's tech giants step up their video game after DeepSeek's success.

Alibaba's Qwen2.5-Max chatbot, Chinese startup DeepSeek and . (Photos: Reuters/Dado Ruvic, AFP/Sebastien Bozon)

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Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT lags CHINA'S AI BOOM?

Transforming the nation into a tech superpower has long been President Xi Jinping's objective and China has its sights on becoming the world leader in AI by 2030.

China views AI as being "strategically crucial" and its foray into the field has been "years in the making", said Chen Qiheng, an affiliated researcher at the Asia Society Policy Institute's Center for China Analysis.

Private and public investments in Chinese AI sped up after ChatGPT took off in 2022 and revealed promises of real-world service applications, Chen told CNA.

But it was DeepSeek's rise that actually "encouraged" the concept that smaller players like start-up firms might have functions to play in AI research and advancements, he adds.

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The "focus on expense advantage" is an unique function of Chinese AI, Chen says, with lower training and inference expenses - the costs of utilizing a trained model to reason from new information.

2025 could likewise see the development of more Chinese AI models dealing with sophisticated reasoning tasks.

"We could see some AI firms concentrating on getting closer to artificial basic intelligence (AGI) while others concentrate on concrete ways to commercialise their designs and integrate them with scientific research study," Chen added.

AGI describes a system with intelligence on par with human capabilities.

Chinese AI companies are moving rapidly, analysts state, developing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own innovative and affordable ways to apply generative AI to jobs and develop more innovative items beyond chatbots.

But on the other side, access to high-end hardware, especially Nvidia's sophisticated AI chips, remains an essential hurdle for [forum.batman.gainedge.org](https://forum.batman.gainedge.org/index.php?action=profile