Chinese AI Bombshell Was Tech We Already Had, American Founder Says
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman expressed skepticism about the recent AI model introduced by Chinese startup DeepSeek, labeled R1, claiming it has been overhyped. During a Washington D.C. event, he acknowledged that while the model, which cost $5.6 million to train, performs some admirable tasks, its capabilities have been exaggerated. Altman noted that the technology level exhibited by R1 is something OpenAI achieved some time ago and emphasized the high costs associated with developing state-of-the-art AI technologies, contrasting it with the significant expenses of models like ChatGPT-4 and Google’s Gemini.
The announcement of DeepSeek’s model triggered a significant market response, leading to a selloff of stocks associated with AI companies. Even though Altman praised the work of DeepSeek as noteworthy, he insisted that substantial investments would still be needed to push AI technology forward. In a broader context, he addressed concerns around DeepSeek possibly utilizing data from OpenAI’s models in violation of their terms of service. The situation illustrates the competitive and rapidly evolving AI landscape where companies strive for innovation while facing hefty training costs. Furthermore, recent announcements from major entities like Oracle and SoftBank underline the increasing investments in AI infrastructure despite regulatory challenges.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on Thursday that the artificial intelligence model released by Chiense technology startup DeepSeek has been largely overhyped.
Altman contended at an event in Washington, D.C., that DeepSeek’s recently announced R1 model, which purportedly cost a mere $5.6 million to train, does a “’couple of nice things’ but has been ‘wildly overstated,’” according to The Hill.
“Again, this is a model at a capability level that we had quite some time ago,” Altman asserted.
“We’ve got a sense of what it takes to run a cost-efficient model,” he added.
“So again, I don’t want to diminish the work. I think this is a great work, and it’s, in some sense, it’s like the first surprise or new competitor to OpenAI in quite a while.”
The reported cost of $5.6 million caused panic in the technology sector as investors questioned the assumption that training artificial intelligence models was extraordinarily expensive.
ChatGPT-4 from OpenAI had a technical creation cost between $41 million and $78 million, according to an analysis published last year by Forbes.
Altman previously said the model cost over $100 million to train.
Gemini from Google reportedly cost between $30 million and $191 million before considering staff salaries.
The unveiling of DeepSeek prompted a massive stock market selloff for artificial intelligence firms like Nvidia.
Altman meanwhile claimed that massive spending would still be required to advance the technology.
“The cost to do a frontier model, to be at the very edge, that goes up — the cost of training, compute, test time, compute, data, whatever you want,” he said, per The Hill.
“The amount of demand there is to use a given level of AI, as you bring that price down, goes up by much more than the decrease in price,” the entrepreneur added.
OpenAI previously said that the company would examine whether DeepSeek “improperly distilled” data from its models, meaning that the Chinese company could have transferred the knowledge of a large model to a smaller version, according to The Hill.
OpenAI forbids distillation to build competing models in its terms of service.
“People will distill our models,” Altman said. “Whatever, that’s fine.”
The consensus that massive costs are required to advance artificial intelligence was demonstrated by the $500 billion “investment in AI infrastructure” recently announced by Oracle, SoftBank, and OpenAI, and unveiled at the White House by President Donald Trump.
No funding for the deal will come from the federal government, but Trump signed an executive order revoking a previous action from now-former President Joe Biden that “hampered the private sector’s ability to innovate in AI by imposing government control over AI development and deployment,” according to a fact sheet from the White House.
The new order also “calls for departments and agencies to revise or rescind all policies, directives, regulations, orders, and other actions taken under the Biden AI order that are inconsistent with enhancing America’s leadership in AI.”
Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.
" Conservative News Daily does not always share or support the views and opinions expressed here; they are just those of the writer."
*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases
Now loading...