DeepSeek, a Chinese AI lab, has captured global attention as its chatbot app climbed to the top of the Apple App Store charts. In November 2023, DeepSeek unveiled a series of advanced AI models, including DeepSeek Coder, DeepSeek LLM, and DeepSeek Chat. These models have been pivotal in the company’s surge to prominence. The release of their next-generation DeepSeek-V2 family in the spring of 2023 particularly caught the eye of the AI industry, setting a new standard for innovative AI solutions.
The success story of DeepSeek is further highlighted by the popularity of its R1 reasoning model. R1 has been downloaded over 2.5 million times on Hugging Face, a platform dedicated to hosting AI models. This model stands out due to its ability to effectively fact-check itself, a feature that helps it avoid common pitfalls encountered by other models. DeepSeek's commitment to compute-efficient techniques in training its models has also enabled them to remain highly cost-competitive in the market.
A key aspect of DeepSeek's strategy involves hiring individuals without a computer science background. This approach ensures that their technology can understand and process a wider range of subjects. The technical team is notably young and focuses on developing AI that adheres to benchmarks set by China's internet regulator. This ensures that their responses align with core socialist values.
The company's rapid ascent has had significant ramifications in the tech world. Notably, Nvidia's stock price has dropped by 18% due to DeepSeek's success. This decline has prompted a public response from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. DeepSeek's achievements have also sparked debates among Wall Street analysts and technologists about whether the U.S. can maintain its leadership in the AI race and if the demand for AI chips will continue at its current pace.
Supported by High-Flyer Capital Management, a Chinese hedge fund that leverages AI for trading decisions, DeepSeek has aggressively recruited doctorate-level AI researchers from leading Chinese universities. This recruitment drive is part of their broader strategy to push the boundaries of AI innovation. Furthermore, DeepSeek has invested in building its own data center clusters for model training, allowing them to train their models efficiently and independently.
Despite having to use Nvidia H800 chips—a less powerful variant compared to those available to U.S. companies—DeepSeek continued its momentum and launched its latest model, DeepSeek-V3, in December 2024. This model has further cemented the company's reputation, with the R1 model performing on par with OpenAI's o1 model in key benchmarks.
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