“We all heard the sound of the starter pistol in the race. Tech companies, big or small, are all on the same starting line,” Wang, who named his startup Baichuan or “A Hundred Rivers,”
. “China is still three years behind the US, but we may not need three years to catch up.”
The number of Chinese venture deals in AI comprised more than two-thirds of the US total of about 447 in the year to mid-June, versus about 50% over the previous two years. China-based AI venture deals also outpaced consumer tech in 2022 and early 2023, according to Preqin.
Ex-Baidu President Zhang Yaqin, now dean of Tsinghua University’s Institute for AI Industry Research and overseer of a number of budding projects, told Chinese media in March that investors sought him out almost daily that month. He estimates there’re as many as 50 firms working on large language models across the country.
