China Is Closing the A.I. Gap With the United States
While the United States has had a head start on A.I. development, China is catching up. In recent weeks, several Chinese companies have unveiled A.I. technologies that rival the leading American systems. And these technologies are already in the hands of consumers, businesses and independent software developers across the globe.
Kuaishou released its video generator, Kling, in China more than a month ago and to users worldwide on Wednesday. Just before Kling’s arrival, 01.AI a start-up co-founded by Kai-Fu Lee, an investor and technologist who helped build Chinese offices for both Google and Microsoft, released chatbot technology that scored nearly as well as the leading American technologies on common benchmark tests that rate the performance of the world’s chatbots.
New technology from the Chinese tech giant Alibaba has also leaped to the top of a leaderboard that rates open-source A.I. systems. “We have disproved the commonplace belief that China doesn’t have the talent or the technology to compete with the U.S.,” Dr. Lee said. “That belief is simply wrong.”