Latest news with #KyleChan
Time of India
16-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Why China's $100 billion AI investment is raising urgent questions for US schools and innovation policies
China is investing nearly $100 billion in artificial intelligence (AI) development as part of a state-backed strategy to become a global superpower in the technology. This significant investment aims to close the technological gap with the United States, which has traditionally led the development of advanced AI systems. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The move has raised questions about how the US education system might need to respond to maintain its competitive edge in the global tech landscape. Over the past decade, China has adopted an industrial policy approach to bolster its AI industry, using government funding to build manufacturing capabilities, develop high-tech infrastructure, and cultivate engineering talent. This approach has previously helped China dominate in industries such as electric vehicles and solar power, and now it is being applied aggressively to AI. China's comprehensive industrial policy for AI The Chinese government's support spans the entire AI tech stack, from semiconductors and data centers to software and energy resources, as noted by Kyle Chan, an adjunct researcher at the RAND Corporation, as quoted by the New York Times. This has included a $100 billion fund established since 2014 to grow the semiconductor industry and an $8.5 billion allocation to support young AI start-ups announced in April. Local governments have also played a role by creating start-up incubators and offering subsidies to attract companies. For example, the Dream Town incubator in Hangzhou, home to major firms like Alibaba and DeepSeek, offers substantial financial incentives and support to emerging AI companies. Deep Principle, a start-up focused on AI applications in chemical research, received a $2.5 million subsidy from a Hangzhou district, along with assistance in securing office and housing space, as reported by the New York Times. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now China's focus on open-source AI systems has accelerated its progress. Companies like Alibaba, ByteDance, Huawei, and Baidu have released open-source AI models to foster broader development and innovation. ByteDance alone invested $11 billion last year in AI infrastructure, including data centers. US companies invest heavily, but government support differs While US technology giants such as Google, Meta, and OpenAI have spent billions on AI research and data centers, the US government has not matched China's level of direct industrial policy support. US restrictions on chip sales to China, including products from Nvidia, aim to limit Beijing's ability to access advanced technology. However, Nvidia recently announced government approval to sell a China-specific chip, the H20, under license. Chinese chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) produces chips for Huawei and others, striving to provide alternatives to Nvidia's technology. According to the New York Times, these chips do not yet match Nvidia's full capabilities but serve as a viable backup in the event of US export restrictions. Data control and censorship shape Chinese AI development Chinese AI companies must operate under government guidelines that restrict access to certain global internet sources. Instead, Beijing provides data resources like the 'mainstream values corpus,' a dataset based on state media content approved for AI training. Companies like ByteDance benefit from vast amounts of user data collected within China to train their systems. Implications for US education and technology leadership The rapid development of China's AI ecosystem has led to concerns about the readiness of the US education system to produce skilled engineers and researchers capable of maintaining American leadership in technology. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, framed the competition as ideological, stressing the importance of democratic AI over authoritarian approaches, as quoted by the New York Times. Kevin Xu, founder of Interconnected Capital, described open-source technology as a form of 'technological soft power,' akin to 'the Hollywood movie or the Big Mac of technology,' highlighting the influence China's approach might have on global engineering communities, according to the New York Times. As China's state-backed investments reshape the global AI landscape, questions remain about how US educational institutions will adapt to prepare the next generation of technology innovators. TOI Education is on WhatsApp now. Follow us .
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
16-07-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
China fuelling AI goals with state backing, open source, infra funding
When OpenAI blocked China's access to its advanced artificial intelligence systems last July, Chinese coders shrugged. They would rely instead on open-source systems, where the underlying technology is shared publicly for others to build on. At the time, that mostly meant turning to another popular American product made by Meta. But in the year since, there has been a major shift in the global race to develop advancedAI Chinese companies like DeepSeek and Alibaba have churned out open-sourceAI systems of their own that rank among the world's top performers. China is quickly closing the gap with the United States in the contest to make technologies that rival the human brain. This is not an accident. The Chinese government has spent a decade funneling resources toward becoming anAI superpower, using the same strategy it used to dominate the electric vehicle and solar power industries. 'China is applying state support across the entireAI tech stack, from chips and data centers down to energy,' said Kyle Chan, an adjunct researcher at the RAND Corporation, a think tank. For the past 10 years, Beijing has pushed Chinese companies to build manufacturing capabilities in high-tech industries for which the country previously depended on imports. That approach helped China become the maker of a third of the world's manufactured goods and a leader in electric vehicles, batteries and solar panels. And it has also been applied to the essential building blocks of advancedAI systems: computing power, skilled engineers and data resources. China pushed that industrial policy approach as three presidential administrations in Washington tried to hold back its ability to make technologies like artificial intelligence, including by restricting sales of chips made by Nvidia, America's leadingAI chipmaker. On Monday, Nvidia said the US government had approved sales, with a license, of a China-specific chip known as the H20. But with Beijing's backing, Chinese companies like Huawei have been racing to develop alternatives to Nvidia's technology. Beijing's approach toAI is intended to help Chinese tech companies make advancements despite Washington's restrictions. In the United States, companies like Google and Meta have spent billions on data centers. But in China, it is the government that has played a major role in financingAI infrastructure and hardware, including data centers, high-capacity servers and semiconductors. To concentrate the country's engineering talent, the Chinese government also financed a network of labs where much of its most advancedAI research takes place, often in collaboration with big tech companies like Alibaba and ByteDance. Beijing has also directed banks and local governments to go on a lending spree that fueled hundreds of start-ups. Since 2014, the government has spent nearly $100 billion on a fund to grow the semiconductor industry, and in April said it would allocate $8.5 billion for youngAI start-ups. Local governments have set up entire neighborhoods that function as start-up incubators, like Dream Town in Hangzhou, a city in China's south that is home to Alibaba and DeepSeek and is known as a hot spot forAI talent. 'For the government to help us cover even 10 or 15 percent of our early-stage research costs, that's a huge benefit,' said Jia Haojun, the founder of Deep Principle, a Hangzhou start-up focused on usingAI for chemical research that raised $10 million last year. Different city districts offer competing incentives to lure start-ups to their areas. Deep Principle received a $2.5 million subsidy from a district in Hangzhou when the start-up moved to the city, Mr. Jia said. A local official helped him find office space and employee housing. AmericanAI systems were built using information from all types of websites, including some that are inaccessible on China's censored internet, like Reddit and Wikipedia. But Chinese companies need to make sure that anyAI products used by the general public comply with Beijing's controls on information. So the government has created data resources that contain approved information for companies to use to train theirAI systems, like one based on state media articles that is called 'the mainstream values corpus.' Chinese tech companies also have an enormous amount of data on how people use the internet, which has helped companies like ByteDance, the parent of TikTok, develop some of the country's most popularAI systems. Yet Beijing's industrial policy approach toAI has also been inefficient. An abundance ofAI start-ups are vying for their piece of a cutthroat market, competing to offer their models at low rates to engineers. This top-down approach also makes it burdensome to shift resources quickly as technology changes. Chinese companies spent years working onAI technologies like facial recognition but were caught off-guard by the advances in generativeAI behind ChatGPT. 'It can be difficult to figure out where to invest and allocate resources,' said Mr. Chan, the RAND researcher. 'A.I. is not like traditional industries like steel or shipbuilding, where the technology is fairly stable.' Much of the government funding has gone to China's leading chipmaker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, which manufactures chips designed by companies like Huawei and Qualcomm. SMIC has raced to produceAI chips for Huawei that are intended to compete with ones made by Nvidia. While Huawei chips may be good enough for some tasks, they cannot do everything Nvidia chips can do. Companies are also reluctant to make the switch because it is difficult for SMIC to manufacture them in large quantities. 'The idea is that in the event of being cut off, there is some viable alternative — even if it is lagging in performance — so China'sAI industry can continue to make some progress instead of being stopped altogether,' Mr. Chan said. Chinese companies are turning to open-sourceAI systems as the fastest way to catch up to rivals in Silicon Valley, which are thought to have at least a few months' lead over China's most advanced technology. In the past year, Alibaba has released several popular open-source systems. ByteDance, which spent $11 billion last year on data centers and otherAI infrastructure, also published details about how it built some of its technology. This month, Huawei released an open-source system. Even Baidu, a Chinese internet company that previously praised the 'monetization potential' of closedAI products, recently released open-source versions of some of its systems. While OpenAI and Google charge a premium for access to their closedAI systems, the Chinese approach of making models publicly available has made it easier for engineers around the world to build on their systems. OpenAI has warned that ChineseAI companies like DeepSeek could block American competitors from markets around the world, giving them the chance to set standards for how the new technology is used. Sam Altman, OpenAI's chief executive, has framed the competition between American and ChineseAI companies as ideological and said he wants to 'make sure democraticAI wins over authoritarianAI' The thinking is that China's approach may appeal to more engineers around the world. 'Open-source is a source of technological soft power,' said Kevin Xu, the US-based founder of Interconnected Capital, a hedge fund that invests in artificial intelligence technologies. 'It is effectively the Hollywood movie or the Big Mac of technology.'
The Star
16-07-2025
- Business
- The Star
China is spending billions to become an AI superpower
TAIPEI, Taiwan: When OpenAI blocked China's access to its advanced artificial intelligence systems last July, Chinese coders shrugged. They would rely instead on open-source systems, where the underlying technology is shared publicly for others to build on. At the time, that mostly meant turning to another popular American product made by Meta. But in the year since, there has been a major shift in the global race to develop advanced AI. Chinese companies such as DeepSeek and Alibaba have churned out open-source AI systems of their own that rank among the world's top performers. China is quickly closing the gap with the United States in the contest to make technologies that rival the human brain. This is not an accident. The Chinese government has spent a decade funneling resources toward becoming an AI superpower, using the same strategy it used to dominate the electric vehicle and solar power industries. 'China is applying state support across the entire AI tech stack, from chips and data centres down to energy,' said Kyle Chan, an adjunct researcher at the RAND Corp, a think tank. For the past 10 years, Beijing has pushed Chinese companies to build manufacturing capabilities in high-tech industries for which the country previously depended on imports. That approach helped China become the maker of a third of the world's manufactured goods and a leader in electric vehicles, batteries and solar panels. And it has also been applied to the essential building blocks of advanced AI systems: computing power, skilled engineers and data resources. China pushed that industrial policy approach as three presidential administrations in Washington tried to hold back its ability to make technologies such as artificial intelligence, including by restricting sales of chips made by Nvidia, America's leading AI chipmaker. On Monday, Nvidia said the US government had approved sales, with a license, of a China-specific chip known as the H20. But with Beijing's backing, Chinese companies like Huawei have been racing to develop alternatives to Nvidia's technology. Beijing's approach to AI is intended to help Chinese tech companies make advancements despite Washington's restrictions. In the United States, companies including Google and Meta have spent billions on data centers. But in China, it is the government that has played a major role in financing AI infrastructure and hardware, including data centers, high-capacity servers and semiconductors. To concentrate the country's engineering talent, the Chinese government also financed a network of labs where much of its most advanced AI research takes place, often in collaboration with big tech companies such as Alibaba and ByteDance. Beijing has also directed banks and local governments to go on a lending spree that fueled hundreds of startups. Since 2014, the government has spent nearly US$100bil (RM424.99bil) on a fund to grow the semiconductor industry, and in April said it would allocate US$8.5bil (RM36.12bil) for young AI startups. Local governments have set up entire neighbourhoods that function as startup incubators, like Dream Town in Hangzhou, a city in China's south that is home to Alibaba and DeepSeek and is known as a hot spot for AI talent. 'For the government to help us cover even 10 or 15% of our early-stage research costs, that's a huge benefit,' said Jia Haojun, the founder of Deep Principle, a Hangzhou startup focused on using AI for chemical research that raised US$10mil (RM42.50mil) last year. Different city districts offer competing incentives to lure startups to their areas. Deep Principle received a US$2.5mil (RM10.62mil) subsidy from a district in Hangzhou when the startup moved to the city, Jia said. A local official helped him find office space and employee housing. American AI systems were built using information from all types of websites, including some that are inaccessible on China's censored internet, such as Reddit and Wikipedia. But Chinese companies need to make sure that any AI products used by the general public comply with Beijing's controls on information. So the government has created data resources that contain approved information for companies to use to train their AI systems, including one based on state media articles that is called 'the mainstream values corpus'. Chinese tech companies also have an enormous amount of data on how people use the Internet, which has helped companies such as ByteDance, the parent of TikTok, develop some of the country's most popular AI systems. Yet Beijing's industrial policy approach to AI has also been inefficient. An abundance of AI startups are vying for their piece of a cutthroat market, competing to offer their models at low rates to engineers. This top-down approach also makes it burdensome to shift resources quickly as technology changes. Chinese companies spent years working on AI technologies such as facial recognition but were caught off-guard by the advances in generative AI behind ChatGPT. 'It can be difficult to figure out where to invest and allocate resources,' said Chan, the RAND researcher. 'AI is not like traditional industries like steel or shipbuilding, where the technology is fairly stable.' Much of the government funding has gone to China's leading chipmaker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp, which manufactures chips designed by companies including Huawei and Qualcomm. SMIC has raced to produce AI chips for Huawei that are intended to compete with ones made by Nvidia. While Huawei chips may be good enough for some tasks, they cannot do everything Nvidia chips can do. Companies are also reluctant to make the switch because it is difficult for SMIC to manufacture them in large quantities. 'The idea is that in the event of being cut off, there is some viable alternative – even if it is lagging in performance – so China's AI industry can continue to make some progress instead of being stopped altogether,' Chan said. Chinese companies are turning to open-source AI systems as the fastest way to catch up to rivals in Silicon Valley, which are thought to have at least a few months' lead over China's most advanced technology. In the past year, Alibaba has released several popular open-source systems. ByteDance, which spent US$11bil (RM46.75bil) last year on data centers and other AI infrastructure, also published details about how it built some of its technology. This month, Huawei released an open-source system. Even Baidu, a Chinese internet company that previously praised the 'monetization potential' of closed AI products, recently released open-source versions of some of its systems. While OpenAI and Google charge a premium for access to their closed AI systems, the Chinese approach of making models publicly available has made it easier for engineers around the world to build on their systems. OpenAI has warned that Chinese AI companies such as DeepSeek could block American competitors from markets around the world, giving them the chance to set standards for how the new technology is used. Sam Altman, OpenAI's CEO, has framed the competition between American and Chinese AI companies as ideological and said he wants to 'make sure democratic AI wins over authoritarian AI.' The thinking is that China's approach may appeal to more engineers around the world. 'Open-source is a source of technological soft power,' said Kevin Xu, the U.S.-based founder of Interconnected Capital, a hedge fund that invests in AI technologies. 'It is effectively the Hollywood movie or the Big Mac of technology.' – ©2025 The New York Times Company This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Time of India
16-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
China is spending billions to become an AI superpower
When OpenAI blocked China 's access to its advanced artificial intelligence systems last July, Chinese coders shrugged. They would rely instead on open-source systems, where the underlying technology is shared publicly for others to build on. At the time, that mostly meant turning to another popular American product made by Meta. But in the year since, there has been a major shift in the global race to develop advanced AI. Chinese companies such as DeepSeek and Alibaba have churned out open-source AI systems of their own that rank among the world's top performers. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Giá vàng đang tăng mạnh trong năm 2025 — Các nhà giao dịch thông minh đã tham gia IC Markets Tìm hiểu thêm Undo China is quickly closing the gap with the United States in the contest to make technologies that rival the human brain. This is not an accident. The Chinese government has spent a decade funneling resources toward becoming an AI superpower , using the same strategy it used to dominate the electric vehicle and solar power industries. "China is applying state support across the entire AI tech stack, from chips and data centers down to energy," said Kyle Chan, an adjunct researcher at the RAND Corp., a think tank. Live Events For the past 10 years, Beijing has pushed Chinese companies to build manufacturing capabilities in high-tech industries for which the country previously depended on imports. That approach helped China become the maker of a third of the world's manufactured goods and a leader in electric vehicles, batteries and solar panels. And it has also been applied to the essential building blocks of advanced AI systems: computing power, skilled engineers and data resources. China pushed that industrial policy approach as three presidential administrations in Washington tried to hold back its ability to make technologies such as artificial intelligence, including by restricting sales of chips made by Nvidia, America's leading AI chipmaker. On Monday, Nvidia said the U.S. government had approved sales, with a license, of a China-specific chip known as the H20. But with Beijing's backing, Chinese companies like Huawei have been racing to develop alternatives to Nvidia's technology. Beijing's approach to AI is intended to help Chinese tech companies make advancements despite Washington's restrictions. In the United States, companies including Google and Meta have spent billions on data centers. But in China, it is the government that has played a major role in financing AI infrastructure and hardware, including data centers, high-capacity servers and semiconductors. To concentrate the country's engineering talent, the Chinese government also financed a network of labs where much of its most advanced AI research takes place, often in collaboration with big tech companies such as Alibaba and ByteDance. Beijing has also directed banks and local governments to go on a lending spree that fueled hundreds of startups. Since 2014, the government has spent nearly $100 billion on a fund to grow the semiconductor industry, and in April said it would allocate $8.5 billion for young AI startups. Local governments have set up entire neighborhoods that function as startup incubators, like Dream Town in Hangzhou, a city in China's south that is home to Alibaba and DeepSeek and is known as a hot spot for AI talent. "For the government to help us cover even 10 or 15% of our early-stage research costs, that's a huge benefit," said Jia Haojun, the founder of Deep Principle, a Hangzhou startup focused on using AI for chemical research that raised $10 million last year. Different city districts offer competing incentives to lure startups to their areas. Deep Principle received a $2.5 million subsidy from a district in Hangzhou when the startup moved to the city, Jia said. A local official helped him find office space and employee housing. American AI systems were built using information from all types of websites, including some that are inaccessible on China's censored internet, such as Reddit and Wikipedia. But Chinese companies need to make sure that any AI products used by the general public comply with Beijing's controls on information. So the government has created data resources that contain approved information for companies to use to train their AI systems, including one based on state media articles that is called "the mainstream values corpus." Chinese tech companies also have an enormous amount of data on how people use the internet, which has helped companies such as ByteDance, the parent of TikTok, develop some of the country's most popular AI systems. Yet Beijing's industrial policy approach to AI has also been inefficient. An abundance of AI startups are vying for their piece of a cutthroat market, competing to offer their models at low rates to engineers. This top-down approach also makes it burdensome to shift resources quickly as technology changes. Chinese companies spent years working on AI technologies such as facial recognition but were caught off-guard by the advances in generative AI behind ChatGPT. "It can be difficult to figure out where to invest and allocate resources," said Chan, the RAND researcher. "AI is not like traditional industries like steel or shipbuilding, where the technology is fairly stable." Much of the government funding has gone to China's leading chipmaker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., which manufactures chips designed by companies including Huawei and Qualcomm. SMIC has raced to produce AI chips for Huawei that are intended to compete with ones made by Nvidia. While Huawei chips may be good enough for some tasks, they cannot do everything Nvidia chips can do. Companies are also reluctant to make the switch because it is difficult for SMIC to manufacture them in large quantities. "The idea is that in the event of being cut off, there is some viable alternative -- even if it is lagging in performance -- so China's AI industry can continue to make some progress instead of being stopped altogether," Chan said. Chinese companies are turning to open-source AI systems as the fastest way to catch up to rivals in Silicon Valley, which are thought to have at least a few months' lead over China's most advanced technology. In the past year, Alibaba has released several popular open-source systems. ByteDance, which spent $11 billion last year on data centers and other AI infrastructure, also published details about how it built some of its technology. This month, Huawei released an open-source system. Even Baidu, a Chinese internet company that previously praised the "monetization potential" of closed AI products, recently released open-source versions of some of its systems. While OpenAI and Google charge a premium for access to their closed AI systems, the Chinese approach of making models publicly available has made it easier for engineers around the world to build on their systems. OpenAI has warned that Chinese AI companies such as DeepSeek could block American competitors from markets around the world, giving them the chance to set standards for how the new technology is used. Sam Altman, OpenAI's CEO, has framed the competition between American and Chinese AI companies as ideological and said he wants to "make sure democratic AI wins over authoritarian AI." The thinking is that China's approach may appeal to more engineers around the world. "Open-source is a source of technological soft power," said Kevin Xu, the U.S.-based founder of Interconnected Capital, a hedge fund that invests in AI technologies. "It is effectively the Hollywood movie or the Big Mac of technology."
The Star
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Star
Meet the jewellery designer dazzling the reality TV world – one ring at a time
Eagle-eyed Bravo viewers may know him as the man behind three different Vanderpump Rules engagement rings, or as the beleaguered best friend of disgraced reality television villain Tom Sandoval. But when Kyle Chan started selling handmade jewellery at the Downtown Los Angeles Art Walk in 2010, he had no idea that he would one day parlay his small stall into a luxury jewellery business famous for its connection to the world of reality stars. Chan immigrated from Hong Kong to the US when he was 13, and started making jewellery after taking a class in high school. 'I fell in love with it, but I just didn't have the money to continue, so I started all kinds of odd jobs,' Chan said in a phone interview. 'I was a waiter. I was working at an airline. I did hair and makeup.' Eventually, he scored a job at a small jewellery boutique, which he managed for seven years before moving into wholesale. Then, in the early 2010s, he met Kyle Richards, the longtime star of the Bravo reality show The Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills . It was then that his career really took off. 'She and her four daughters would always go to the Pasadena Rose Bowl Flea Market, so that's how I met her,' Chan said. 'She was very kind, and she would buy my jewellery, even though I would insist I'd give it to her for free. But she said, 'No, no, no, I'd like to buy it, I want to show support.'' Read more: 'Doing what I love': Malaysian fashion designer Zang Toi is living his best life Kyle Chan immigrated from Hong Kong to the US when he was 13, and started making jewellery after taking a class in high school. Photo: Instagram/Kyle Chan Design Richards started wearing his pieces on the show, which premiered in October 2010, and posting about them to her millions of followers. When he graduated from making silver and gold-filled pieces into more luxury fare, she began carrying his designs at her since-shuttered Beverly Hills boutique, Kyle By Alene Too. Miley Cyrus, who Chan said was a frequent visitor at one of the small boutiques where his pieces were sold, also wore some of his designs. 'I told the sales girl, 'Whenever a celebrity comes by, whatever they want, they can take it, right?'' Chan said. 'But they said that Miley insisted on paying for everything.' Since then, Chan's work has been sold at more than 300 retail boutiques worldwide, and he's appeared on two Bravo shows and a Netflix show called Bling Empire . In 2021, he opened his flagship boutique, Kyle Chan Design, in Beverly Grove. Celebrities like Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga and Beyonce have worn his jewellery, and he designed a pair of earrings and a necklace worn by Emma Stone in La La Land . Much of Chan's initial success can be attributed to his connection to the reality television world. After meeting Richards, he ran into the cast of Vanderpump Rules at the opening of Pump Restaurant in West Hollywood in 2014. The show, which followed a cast of outrageously behaved 20-something servers at Sur, a restaurant owned by Lisa Vanderpump, known for her role in Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills , had just hit the air. 'I told them, 'If you need jewellery for season two, I can help,'' he said. 'So they would wear a few of my pieces. Back then, it was nothing expensive.' When members of the Vanderpump Rules cast started getting engaged, Chan designed custom rings for two of its biggest couples: Tom Schwartz and Katie Maloney, and Jax Taylor and Brittany Cartwright (both couples have since filed for divorce). On a recent episode of the Vanderpump Rules spinoff The Valley , Chan was revealed to be the jeweller behind cast member Kristen Doute's engagement ring. Although they began as professional connections, many Bravo stars have become like family, Chan said. He said he was particularly close with Luke Broderick, Doute's fiance and co-star on The Valley, as well as with Sandoval, a Vanderpump Rules star who, in 2023, was revealed to have cheated on his girlfriend with a mutual friend in what was quickly nicknamed 'Scandoval'. When Sandoval fell out with many of his longtime friends over the affair, Chan was frequently filmed showing up to his parties and playing the role of supportive bestie. 'People will always just go, 'Why is he everywhere?'' Chan said, referring to his reality television ubiquity. 'And I'm like, 'I just happen to be friends with them.'' In addition to his reality television connections, Chan's unique approach to marketing has allowed him to stand out in the old-fashioned world of jewellery sales. Read more: Fashion fabulosity: Sly Stone didn't just change music – he changed style too 'I have this vision of celebrity-driven marketing, because I believe in marketing,' Chan said. 'When I was working at retail and wholesale, I realised that a lot of jewellery stores worked their whole lives struggling and had no identity because they just needed to get by. "Anytime when there's an economic crisis or anything, jewellery stores are always the first to suffer.' Chan did not want his business to endure a similar fate, and saw his celebrity customers as a unique way to grow his empire. His approach to luxury jewellery is loud, as opposed to the quiet luxury trend of recent years, and on his website, you can shop for pieces by which celebrity has worn them, including Mariah Carey, Paris Hilton and Nicki Minaj. His next project, a bedazzled bottle of whiskey he will be releasing in collaboration with the brand Gold Bar, is equally flashy. Despite all of the celebrity connections, Chan believes his success can be largely attributed to not letting Hollywood change him. 'All these years, I just choose to stay true to myself and be genuine and people can feel it and it's contagious,' he said. 'When I see a good person, I collect them, and I keep them in my orbit.' – ©2025 The New York Times Company This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
