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Chinese AI Leaders Put Odds Under 20% of Overtaking U.S. in 3–5 Years

Researchers pointed to a steep compute deficit with restricted access to advanced chips as the primary obstacle.

Overview

  • At Tsinghua University’s AGI-Next summit in Beijing, Alibaba Qwen lead Lin Junyang said the chance of any Chinese firm surpassing U.S. AI giants in the next three to five years is below 20%.
  • Lin cited U.S. access to computational resources one to two orders of magnitude larger, noting that OpenAI devotes vast capacity to next‑generation research.
  • He added that most compute in China is tied up meeting daily commercial demand, leaving little for frontier experimentation.
  • Zhipu AI co-founder Tang Jie echoed the caution, saying perceptions of recent gains may mask a gap that could be widening.
  • Coverage highlighted shortages of advanced chips and chipmaking equipment under U.S. export controls, even as Chinese models narrow benchmark gaps and are widely open-sourced.