Another week, another new innovation from China’s AI labs. DeepSeek just released a new version of its V4 Flash model, which outperforms most top Western models, is priced far more cheaply than even its competitors, and is small enough to run on cheaper hardware.
Whether it’s GLM-5.2, Kimi K3, or DeepSeek V4, China’s open-source AI models are reshaping how we think about AI. In order to maintain its strategic technological advantage, the U.S. imposed strict export controls on China to limit global access to advanced compute and throttle foreign artificial intelligence development. Yet these policies instead acted as a massive stimulus for innovation. Denied unlimited access to top-tier hardware, global labs were pushed to optimize their algorithms and adopt open-source architectures.
