China's open-source embrace upends conventional wisdom around artificial intelligence
China’s artificial intelligence space is moving towards free-use, open-sourced models in a trend that experts say will accelerate AI adoption and innovation.
China is embracing open-source AI models in a trend market watchers and insiders say is boosting AI adoption and innovation in the country, with some suggesting it is an 'Android moment' for the sector.
The open-source shift has been spearheaded by AI startup DeepSeek, whose R1 model released earlier this year challenged American tech dominance and raised questions over Big Tech's massive spending on large language models and data centers.
While R1 created a splash in the sector due to its performance and claims of lower costs, some analysts say the most significant impact of DeepSeek has been in catalyzing the adoption of open-source AI models.
"DeepSeek's success proves that open-source strategies can lead to faster innovation and broad adoption," said Wei Sun, principal analyst of artificial intelligence at Counterpoint Research, noting a large number of firms have implemented the model.
"Now, we see that R1 is actively reshaping China's AI landscape, with large companies like Baidu moving to open source their own LLMs in a strategic response," she added.
On March 16, Baidu released the latest version of its AI model, Ernie 4.5, as well as a new reasoning model, Ernie X1, making them free for individual users. Baidu also plans to make the Ernie 4.5 model series open-source from end-June.