DeepSeek, a small Chinese Artificial intelligence (AI) startup, has stunned the tech-world with its popularity a week after it's flagship model, R1 release.
The AI app hit No.1 on the Apple app store free apps chart, as reported by MSN.
On January 20, the model was made public by the hedge fund manager and renowned name in Chinese tech-world world Liang Wenfeng.
DeepSeek was founded in May 2023 and operates independently but is solely funded by High-Flyer, which is also supervised by Wenfeng.
The company hiring policies focused on skills rather than work experience, making the company run by top-graduates from Chinese universities with a fresh perspective of AI world with a complete understanding Chinese culture and language.
R1, which caught the attention of AI world and Silicon Valley, with it's cost efficiency and technology has the potential to surpass some of its US counterparts including OpenAI, Meta and Google.
Notably, the US market has spent billions to get their hands on high-level chips and data to build models that can solve complex problems.
However, DeepSeek engineers are building the models with relatively cheaper Nvidia chips and less capital.
Along with that, following President Donald Trump’s inauguration, OpenAI is set to receive federal funds worth of $500 billion on AI infrastructure over the next four years.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT currently sits at number two on the same Apple chart, while DeepSeek is making it's mark in US tech market.
