"Breakthroughs Over Billions": How DeepSeek's Founder Rejects Big Tech Money to Run a Lean 'Navy SEAL' Team for AGI
“we are in the early stage of a revolution companies should focus on breakthroughs instead of monetization”
DeepSeek, one of China's and the worlds leading AI research startups, is facing questions about its commercial viability despite its technical achievements in the AGI race. In an exclusive interview with the Financial Times, insights into the company's business challenges have emerged.
"It didn't even have any consumer product until the launch of R1 [the company's reasoning large language model]," noted Yusen Dai, founding partner at Zhen Fund, in a Chinese podcast this week.
This lack of commercial focus has created space for tech giants like Alibaba and Tencent to dominate the corporate market with their more established infrastructure and services, raising questions about the sustainability of DeepSeek's revenue strategy.
In a notable example of this commercial gap, Apple recently selected Alibaba's Qwen model over DeepSeek to power AI functions on iPhones in China later this year.
Despite these challenges, DeepSeek appears to be doubling down on its innovation-first approach. The company's V4 models, initially planned for a May release, may be accelerated to maintain momentum, according to a person familiar with the plans.
"We are at the early stage of a revolution where the technology improvement curve is steep," explained Dai. He defended the innovation-focused strategy by adding that companies should prioritize breakthroughs over monetization because "a high school student can't make much money, while if you train him to become PhD, he can make a lot more."
Read the full Financial Times article here.
