Chinese startup DeepSeek tanked tech stocks on Monday after releasing its DeepSeek R1 reasoning AI model. In a research paper, the company revealed that it trained R1 using software innovations rather than having access to massive hardware resources like OpenAI and other US companies.
US sanctions block Chinese companies from purchasing the AI chips they need to match OpenAI, Google, and other AI firms in the West. The claim that software optimizations can replace hardware is what hurt the stock market, especially NVIDIA and other AI hardware companies.
In the aftermath of Monday’s bloodbath, I said the worries were overblown. Software optimization can’t fully replace hardware capabilities. I also pointed out that US companies like OpenAI will likely test and deploy some of the software innovations DeepSeek came up with. But they will also have a massively superior infrastructure. In turn, OpenAI and others can deliver similar breakthroughs, further reduce the cost of access, and outperform the likes of DeepSeek.
While that was speculation from yours truly, someone who doesn’t develop artificial intelligence models for a living, you’ll also want to read Dario Amodei’s detailed explanation of what DeepSeek achieved, what it means for the current moment in the AI war between the US and China, and how it impacts the road to AGI.
As the CEO of Anthropic and a former lead engineer at OpenAI, Amodei is among the most qualified AI experts to dissect the DeepSeek breakthrough.
Amodei does a great job explaining how AI development works, why DeepSeek’s innovations are important, why the training costs the Chinese startup proposed are misleading, and why the US has a big advantage over China thanks to access to superior hardware.
The post DeepSeek isn’t as great as it seems and won’t help China beat the US to AGI: Dario Amodei appeared first on BGR.
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DeepSeek isn’t as great as it seems and won’t help China beat the US to AGI: Dario Amodei originally appeared on BGR.com on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 at 08:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.