Latest news with #WAIC
Qatar Tribune
2 hours ago
- Business
- Qatar Tribune
China bids to lap US in AI leadership
Agencies Beyond dancing robots and eager-to-help digital avatars, Shanghai's World AI Conference saw China stake its claim to global artificial intelligence leadership and frame itself as a clear alternative to the United States. Assumptions that the U.S. was far ahead in the fast-moving field were upended this year when Chinese start-up DeepSeek unveiled a chatbot that matched top American systems for an apparent fraction of the cost. With AI now at the forefront of the superpowers' tech race, the World AI Conference (WAIC) that ended Tuesday saw China set out its case to take charge on shaping its global governance too. China, the United States and other major economies are 'engaged in a marathon at Formula One speed', said Steven Hai, assistant professor of tech innovation at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University.'Which country will attain the upper hand can only be assessed dynamically over the course of development.' China and the United States dominate the AI sector -- only 10 to 15 percent of models developed in recent years were built without either's participation, according to Epoch AI, a non-profit research institute. While U.S. companies like Google and OpenAI are still industry-leading, the institute labelled 78 percent of Chinese models 'state-of-the-art' compared to 70 percent of models built with American participation. Beijing's stated aim is to become the world's leading AI 'innovation centre' by 2030. 'Now China is neck-and-neck with the United States in terms of core tech, that play (for global leadership) is more relevant than ever,' said Tom Nunlist, associate director for tech and data policy at Trivium China.'With a solid AI offering and the U.S. turning inward, the question is will Beijing's vision gain greater global traction?' In May, Microsoft's Brad Smith told the U.S. Senate that 'the number-one factor' in the tech race 'is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world'. China's offer is technical and economical. 'One of the biggest differences (with the U.S. sector) is that most of the leading models in China... are open-weight and open-source,' former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told an audience at WAIC. That means they can be adapted by other countries to fit their own needs, said George Chen, partner at Washington-based policy consultancy The Asia Group. 'We already see some countries like Mongolia, Kazakhstan, even Pakistan are trying to adopt the DeepSeek model to build their own,' he said. 'China has a chance to win in the aspect of sovereign AI to export its model to those countries.' The comparative low cost of Chinese technology -- software but also hardware, for example through firms like Huawei -- will be a big factor, especially for developing countries, Chen added. On Monday another Chinese start-up, Zhipu, announced its new AI model -- also open-source -- would cost less than DeepSeek to use. In June, OpenAI accused Zhipu of having close ties with Chinese authorities and noted it was working with governments and state-owned firms across Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa. 'The goal is to lock Chinese systems and standards into emerging markets before U.S. or European rivals can,' it has moved to protect its lead in AI, expanding efforts to curb exports of state-of-the-art chips to China in recent years. 'While limiting China's share of the global AI hardware market, (these measures) have accelerated indigenous innovation and led Chinese firms to exploit regulatory loopholes,' said assistant professor Hai, referring to 'rife' smuggling and challenges to homegrown firms include the closed nature of the Chinese internet, and 'general issues of trust when it comes to using Chinese tech', Trivium's Nunlist said. At WAIC, China sought to present itself as a responsible power. Premier Li Qiang emphasised the risks of AI and pledged to share technology with other nations, especially developing ones. His remarks contrasted sharply with U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive low-regulation 'AI Action Plan' launched just days before and explicitly aimed at cementing U.S. dominance in the field.
The Star
9 hours ago
- Business
- The Star
AI startup Anaconda raises $150 million in Series C funding led by Insight Partners
FILE PHOTO: An AI (Artificial Intelligence) sign is seen at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai, China July 6, 2023. REUTERS/Aly Song/File Photo (Reuters) -Anaconda, a leading provider of open-source Python software for data science and AI, has raised more than $150 million in a Series C funding round led by Insight Partners, with additional participation from Abu Dhabi's Mubadala Capital. The funding round values the startup at $1.5 billion, Bloomberg News reported, citing a person familiar with the matter. The company said on Thursday the fresh capital will support product development, potential acquisitions, and international expansion, as well as provide liquidity for employees. The funding comes amid increased competition in the enterprise AI software sector, with Python continuing to dominate as the programming language of choice for AI development. U.S. startup funding has surged 75.6% in the first half of 2025, led by the AI boom, putting it on track for its second-best year ever, even as venture capital firms struggled to raise money, according to PitchBook. This year's boom has been driven largely by major AI investments and bold bets from big tech companies, a wave of activity set off by the debut of ChatGPT in late 2022. In the past three months alone, $69.9 billion was invested in U.S. startups. Anaconda did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment regarding the valuation. The company is seeking to capitalize on growing enterprise demand for open-source tools as organizations shift from isolated data science projects to broader AI applications. The startup has also expanded its leadership team, hiring executives with backgrounds in enterprise technology and product innovation. The funding follows Anaconda's launch of a new AI platform and a partnership with Databricks. (Reporting by Kritika Lamba in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)
The Star
13 hours ago
- Business
- The Star
AI infrastructure company fal raises $125 million, valuing company at $1.5 billion
FILE PHOTO: An AI (Artificial Intelligence) sign is seen at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai, China July 6, 2023. REUTERS/Aly Song/File Photo SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -Artificial intelligence infrastructure company fal raised a $125 million Series C round valuing the company at $1.5 billion, the company said Thursday. Venture capital fund Meritech led the round with participation from Salesforce Ventures, Shopify Ventures and Google AI Futures fund. Existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners, Kindred Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, Notable Capital, First Round Capital, Unusual Ventures and Village Global also participated in the round. San Francisco-based fal, which specializes in running audio, video and image models on behalf of enterprises, is part of a growing class of service providers to companies looking to use AI models that are not text-based, sometimes known as multimodal models or generative media models. In particular, image generation AI models, where users type in prompts to generate novel images, have taken off with consumers this year. While ChatGPT's initial viral takeoff was from its ability to generate paragraphs of text, its most recent viral moment came in April when it unveiled the ability to create images based on the hand-drawn style of famed Japanese animation outfit Studio Ghibli. Thanks to that feature, ChatGPT's average weekly active users breached the 150 million mark for the first time, according to data from market research firm Similarweb. Most of fal's customers are using its platform for enterprise purposes, such as to create different images of a product for an ecommerce website or for online advertising. "With generative AI, you can create infinite iterations of the same ad," fal CEO Burkay Gur told Reuters. "You can create different versions for different demographics. You can A/B test it as much as you want. And there is incremental value on each asset that you create." (Reporting by Anna Tong in San Francisco; Editing by Stephen Coates)
Japan Today
16 hours ago
- Business
- Japan Today
China bids to lap U.S. in AI leadership
Beijing aims to become the world's leading AI 'innovation centre' by 2030 By Rebecca BAILEY Beyond dancing robots and eager-to-help digital avatars, Shanghai's World AI Conference saw China stake its claim to global artificial intelligence leadership and frame itself as a clear alternative to the United States. Assumptions that the U.S. was far ahead in the fast-moving field were upended this year when Chinese start-up DeepSeek unveiled a chatbot that matched top American systems for an apparent fraction of the cost. With AI now at the forefront of the superpowers' tech race, the World AI Conference (WAIC) that ended Tuesday saw China set out its case to take charge on shaping its global governance too. China, the United States and other major economies are "engaged in a marathon at Formula One speed", said Steven Hai, assistant professor of tech innovation at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. "Which country will attain the upper hand can only be assessed dynamically over the course of development." China and the United States dominate the AI sector -- only 10 to 15 percent of models developed in recent years were built without either's participation, according to Epoch AI, a non-profit research institute. While U.S. companies like Google and OpenAI are still industry-leading, the institute labelled 78 percent of Chinese models "state-of-the-art" compared to 70 percent of models built with American participation. Beijing's stated aim is to become the world's leading AI "innovation centre" by 2030. "Now China is neck-and-neck with the United States in terms of core tech, that play (for global leadership) is more relevant than ever," said Tom Nunlist, associate director for tech and data policy at Trivium China. "With a solid AI offering and the U.S. turning inward, the question is will Beijing's vision gain greater global traction?" In May, Microsoft's Brad Smith told the U.S. Senate that "the number-one factor" in the tech race "is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world". China's offer is technical and economical. "One of the biggest differences (with the U.S. sector) is that most of the leading models in China... are open-weight and open-source," former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told an audience at WAIC. That means they can be adapted by other countries to fit their own needs, said George Chen, partner at Washington-based policy consultancy The Asia Group. "We already see some countries like Mongolia, Kazakhstan, even Pakistan are trying to adopt the DeepSeek model to build their own," he said. "China has a chance to win in the aspect of sovereign AI to export its model to those countries." The comparative low cost of Chinese technology -- software but also hardware, for example through firms like Huawei -- will be a big factor, especially for developing countries, Chen added. On Monday another Chinese start-up, Zhipu, announced its new AI model -- also open-source -- would cost less than DeepSeek to use. In June, OpenAI accused Zhipu of having close ties with Chinese authorities and noted it was working with governments and state-owned firms across Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa. "The goal is to lock Chinese systems and standards into emerging markets before U.S. or European rivals can," it said. Washington has moved to protect its lead in AI, expanding efforts to curb exports of state-of-the-art chips to China in recent years. "While limiting China's share of the global AI hardware market, (these measures) have accelerated indigenous innovation and led Chinese firms to exploit regulatory loopholes," said assistant professor Hai, referring to "rife" smuggling and circumvention. Issues of trust? Other challenges to homegrown firms include the closed nature of the Chinese internet, and "general issues of trust when it comes to using Chinese tech", Trivium's Nunlist said. At WAIC, China sought to present itself as a responsible power. Premier Li Qiang emphasised the risks of AI and pledged to share technology with other nations, especially developing ones. His remarks contrasted sharply with U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive low-regulation "AI Action Plan" launched just days before and explicitly aimed at cementing U.S. dominance in the field. China released its own action plan at WAIC, following a meeting attended by delegates from dozens of countries. Li also announced the establishment of a China-led organization for international AI cooperation. However, China's foreign ministry did not respond to a request from AFP for details on the set-up of the organization -- including any international participants -- and several foreign delegates said they had not been briefed on the announcement beforehand. Analyst Grace Shao wrote it was clear AI was still in its "infancy stage". "You can sense that vibrant energy but also the immaturity of the space," she wrote on Substack. "There just shouldn't be a definitive conclusion on who is 'winning' yet." © 2025 AFP
The Star
a day ago
- Business
- The Star
Humanoid robots embodiment of China's AI ambitions
SHANGHAI: Serving craft beer, playing mahjong, stacking shelves and boxing, the dozens of humanoid robots at Shanghai's World AI Conference (WAIC) last weekend were embodiments of China's growing AI prowess and ambition. The annual event is primed at showcasing China's progress in the ever-evolving field of artificial intelligence, with the government aiming to position the country as a world leader on both technology and regulation as it snaps at the United States' heels. Premier Li Qiang announced China would set up a new organisation for cooperation on AI governance, warning the benefits of development must be balanced with the risks. But in the cavernous expo next door, the mood was more giddy than concerned. "Demand is currently very strong, whether in terms of data, scenarios, model training, or artificial construction. The overall atmosphere in all these areas is very lively," said Yang Yifan, R&D director at Transwarp, a Shanghai-based AI platform provider. This year's WAIC is the first since a breakthrough moment for Chinese AI this January when startup DeepSeek unveiled an AI model that performed as well as top US systems for an apparent fraction of the cost. Organisers said the forum involved more than 800 companies, showcasing over 3,000 products – the undeniable crowd pleasers being the humanoid robots and their raft of slightly surreal party tricks. At one booth, a robot played drums, half a beat out of time, to Queen's We Will Rock You while a man in safety goggles and a security vest hyped up a giggling crowd. Other droids, some dressed in working overalls or baseball caps, manned assembly lines, played curling with human opponents or sloppily served soft drinks from a dispenser. While most of the machines on display were still a little jerky, the increasing sophistication year-on-year was clear to see. The Chinese government has poured support into robotics, an area in which some experts think China might already have the upper hand over the United States. At Hangzhou-based Unitree's stall, its G1 android – around 130 centimetres (four feet) tall, with a two-hour battery life – kicked, pivoted and punched, keeping its balance with relative fluidity as it shadowboxed around a ring. Ahead of the conference's opening, Unitree announced it would launch a full-size humanoid, the R1, for under US$6,000 (RM 25,413) . 'Digital humans' Most high-tech helpers don't need hardware though. At the expo, AI companions – in the form of middle-aged businessmen, scantily clad women and ancient warriors – waved at people from screens, asking how their day was, while other stalls ran demos allowing visitors to create their own digital avatars. Tech giant Baidu on Saturday announced a new generation of technology for its "digital humans" – AI agents modelled on real people, which it says are "capable of thinking, making decisions, and collaborating". The company recently ran a six-hour e-commerce broadcast hosted by the "digital human" of a well-known streamer and another avatar. The two agents beat the human streamer's debut sales in some categories, Baidu said. Over ten thousand businesses are using the technology daily already, the department's head Wu Chenxia told AFP. Asked about the impact on jobs – one of the major concerns raised around widespread AI adoption – Wu insisted that AI was a tool that should be used to improve quality and save time and effort, which still required human input. In China, the integration of AI into everyday life is beginning to pick up pace. At WAIC, Baidu also announced it had been granted a permit to operate fully driverless robotaxis in parts of the massive Pudong district, the service's first foray into downtown Shanghai. For now, few visitors to the WAIC expo seemed worried about the potential ramifications of the back-flipping dog robots they were excitedly watching. "When it comes to China's AI development, we have a comparatively good foundation of data and also a wealth of application scenarios," said Transwarp's Yang. "There are many more opportunities for experimentation." – AFP
