AI Dominated by China’s Copycat Culture

China’s Rise in the AI Domain: A Challenge to the US

China has emerged as a major player in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), challenging the dominance of the US. Despite geopolitical hurdles, China’s unique culture and innovative research have positioned it as a contender in the global AI race. Just as Google introduced the Bert language models in 2018, Baidu responded with its own model called Ernie. Both models were named after characters from the children’s show ‘Sesame Street,’ highlighting the intense competition between the two nations.

Although the US is currently leading the AI revolution with generative AI, China has made significant strides in this field as well. OpenAI’s ChatGPT has revolutionized the AI landscape, but China has responded with its own competitor called Ernie Bot. Alibaba, the e-commerce giant, has also released Tongyi Qianwen, its own generative AI product. Furthermore, Tencent is working on a proprietary Large Language Model that could potentially surpass all others in China. In fact, Chinese entities have introduced a remarkable 79 large-language models within the country in the last three years alone, as reported by Reuters.

China already holds a strong position in computer vision, a subset of AI, beating initial research efforts in the US from the 1960s. The Chinese government has heavily invested in this area to support its state surveillance systems, making computer vision a strategic priority. Chinese investors have played a significant role in funding computer vision firms, with VC investment quadrupling to over $8 billion between 2016 and 2018. Chinese investors led the field, contributing over 56% of total investment and dominating eight out of the top ten deals.

China is also at the forefront of AI research, accounting for one-third of the global output in terms of AI research papers published and AI citations in 2021. Many Chinese products, such as the popular app TikTok, have gained widespread global traction. TikTok’s success forced other social media platforms like Facebook-owned Instagram and Google-owned YouTube to launch similar short-video features. TikTok owes its popularity to its AI-powered algorithm, which continuously adapts and enhances user experiences based on feedback and behavior.

Leading Chinese companies like Baidu, Alibaba, and Huawei have become household names, with significant investments in generative AI. Baidu’s Apollo project focuses on autonomous driving and has partnered with companies like BMW and Ford. Huawei’s AI chips are used in smartphones and other devices, and its AI capabilities are utilized by businesses worldwide through its cloud services.

While OpenAI’s GPT-4 currently holds the title of the most advanced AI model, China’s Ernie Bot stands out for its tailored understanding of the Chinese language and culture. Reports suggest that Ernie 3.5 has outperformed OpenAI’s ChatGPT in various significant metrics. Although OpenAI has no plans for GPT-5 or models surpassing GPT-4, there are rumors of Google working on a potential advancement beyond GPT-4 called Gemini. Nevertheless, China could potentially unveil the next major breakthrough in AI.

China has set a target to become the world leader in AI by 2030, and it has already laid a solid foundation to achieve this goal. The country’s investments in AI are second only to the US, and it is expected to double its investment to nearly $27 billion by 2026. China’s AI labs are rapidly catching up with their Western counterparts, with advantageous implementation of AI across various aspects of society.

China’s advancements in AI have raised concerns among US experts and investors. The US cannot afford to slow down its progress in AI, as it could give China a competitive advantage. China has some of the best AI talent in the world, and collaboration between nations will be crucial in solving alignment issues and advancing AI technologies.

One of China’s biggest advantages is its vast amount of data. With more internet users than the US and Europe combined, China generates massive amounts of data that can fuel foundational AI models. Data privacy regulations in China are comparatively less stringent than in the West, providing Chinese labs an edge in developing large-language models. Additionally, Chinese labs have easier access to valuable public datasets due to lenient data privacy laws. While most data generated in China is in Chinese, Chinese labs have trained models like Erniebot on both English and Chinese datasets.

As China continues to make remarkable advancements in AI, the US is imposing export controls on AI-enabling hardware. This further intensifies the geopolitical competition between the US and China in the field of AI.

Editor Notes:

China’s rise in the AI domain is remarkable and poses a challenge to the US’s dominance in this field. The country’s strategic investments, cultural factors, and focus on computer vision have placed it at the forefront of AI development. Chinese companies like Baidu, Alibaba, and Huawei have become global leaders in generative AI, with products and technologies that are shipped worldwide. While the US leads in some areas like generative AI, China’s tailored understanding of its language and culture gives it an advantage in developing AI models that cater specifically to the Chinese market. With its extensive use of AI and data advantage, China is well on its way to becoming an AI superpower. It will be interesting to see how this competition unfolds in the coming years.

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