This photo illustration shows the DeepSeek app on a mobile phone in Beijing on January 27, 2025. Chinese firm DeepSeek’s artificial intelligence chatbot has soared to the top of the Apple Store’s download charts, stunning industry insiders and analysts with its ability to match its US competitors. (Photo by GREG BAKER / AFP)
US President Donald Trump said Monday the low-cost Chinese AI model DeepSeek was a “wake up call” for US firms, after its emergence caused a rout in tech shares.
“I would say that could be a positive,” Trump said. “So instead of spending billions and billions, you’ll spend less, and you’ll come up with hopefully the same solution.”
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Trump’s comments came after US chip-maker Nvidia, whose semiconductors power the AI industry, led a massacre in tech stocks, losing nearly $600 billion of its market value.
The chatbot developed by DeepSeek, a startup based in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou, has apparently shown the ability to match the capacity of US AI pace-setters for a fraction of the investments made by American companies.
Just last week following his inauguration for a second term, Trump announced a $500 billion venture to build infrastructure for AI in the United States led by Japanese giant SoftBank and ChatGPT-maker OpenAI.