DeepSeek might be the buzziest ChatGPT rival out there right now, but according to Arm CEO Rene Haas, it may already be headed for trouble.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Haas shared his predictions on China's overnight ChatGPT competitor, which has exploded in popularity over the past several weeks since its launch in December 2024.
His outlook? Grim to say the least.
Arm CEO Rene Haas sheds doubt on DeepSeek after meteoric launch
In a February 10 interview with the Financial Times, Arm CEO Rene Haas weighed in on the controversial new AI model DeepSeek R1 and its shake-up of the AI industry. While U.S. users seem intrigued by DeepSeek after its app launch in December 2024 (it already has over 6,000 ratings on the App Store), Haas seemed skeptical about DeepSeek's future.
Haas predicts DeepSeek will "get shut down," most likely due to foreign policy, since DeepSeek, like TikTok, is a Chinese company.
Haas commented in the interview, "Think about it . . . if you’re not going to allow a TikTok, why would you allow this?"
Haas stressed, however, that this was only a prediction and he wasn't "operating on any knowledge."
Will DeepSeek get banned in the US?
A potential ban on the DeepSeek app in the U.S. doesn't seem far-fetched given existing tensions between the U.S. and China in the tech sector and DeepSeek's worrying shake-up to current industry giants.
California-based Nvidia, which manufactures the world's leading AI chips, lost a record-breaking $593 billion in market value in a single day as a result of DeepSeek R1's launch. DeepSeek claims its open-source AI model can deliver similar performance to U.S. rivals like ChatGPT at a much lower cost, which led investors to doubt future demand for Nvidia's powerful AI chips.
On top of market woes, DeepSeek is also raising similar concerns around privacy like those TikTok has been grappling with for years. Just as those privacy concerns have led to multiple near-bans for TikTok, they could also lead to a ban on DeepSeek for U.S. users, which seems to be what Arm CEO Rene Haas is predicting.
Right now it's too soon to say whether or not DeepSeek will be banned. However, a ban might only impact the official DeepSeek app rather than the model as a whole. Since DeepSeek is open-source, anyone can access, modify, and validate its code, or even use it in their own products. So, another company, like a U.S.-based tech developer, could make their own AI app that uses their own version of DeepSeek, which might not be affected by a ban.
We'll be covering all the latest updates on DeepSeek and its controversial rise in the AI industry, so stay tuned for more info.
