What is the connection between a local Chinese government office, a nuclear power facility, and a mobile shooting game? To capitalise on the viral success of the domestic tech startup, they have all attempted to integrate DeepSeek’s R1 artificial intelligence model into their operations during the last two months.
DeepSeek has been making headlines in China since the Chinese AI firm went viral, yet the news hardly has anything to do with DeepSeek. Companies across various sectors are eager to announce their successful incorporation of DeepSeek’s open-source models into their business strategies.
While some have discovered real applications for the homegrown, reasonably priced AI model with state-of-the-art capabilities, others are only doing so to bolster their national pride or garner media attention.
According to local press sources, more than twenty Chinese manufacturers have announced that they are integrating DeepSeek’s chatbot into their cars. About 30 pharmaceutical and medical businesses have reported using DeepSeek for various purposes, including clinical diagnosis and research.
Numerous banks, insurance providers, and brokerage houses nationwide have also revealed that they are utilising DeepSeek to train customer care representatives, create investment plans, and perform related duties.
The craze is similar to what happened in 2022 when ChatGPT was introduced and American and European businesses rushed to figure out how to let investors and customers know they were interacting with the most advanced AI technology at the time.
DeepSeek shocked the world by releasing an AI model that the startup claimed was built using far fewer computing resources than comparable models released by major companies. Since then, Chinese tech giants like Baidu and Alibaba have released impressive AI models, but they have never been able to garner the same level of attention as DeepSeek.
As of March 11, almost 5,000 enquiries concerning DeepSeek had been recorded on a Chinese online stock exchange platform that allows private investors to contact publicly traded companies. Most of these enquiries ask specific companies if they have thought about or are currently utilising DeepSeek in their products.
As a result, hundreds of businesses have acknowledged that they are implementing the technology, which often results in a brief rise in stock price. However, some companies’ value drops after investors realise that they are merely claiming to be testing DeepSeek’s programme internally.
Certain DeepSeek-related statements, such as cloud computing businesses announcing that they will offer DeepSeek-R1 to their clients and Chinese domestic AI chip manufacturers tailoring their chips to run DeepSeek’s models, make perfect sense.
DeepSeek’s AI may not help many companies that seem only interested in influence in the long run. For instance, Cherry, a German manufacturer of computer accessories, introduced an “AI mouse” in China that allows users to lift it to their mouth, press a button, and immediately speak with DeepSeek’s chatbot.
Tencent’s mobile shooting game uses DeepSeek to power an in-game assistant that can, among other things, tell players if they are going to have a nice gaming session that day. State-owned nuclear power operator CGN Power said that DeepSeek had been integrated into its AI system to help staff members “understand complex questions and deal with them efficiently.”
China’s local governments are also adopting DeepSeek. Shenzhen officials stated that DeepSeek-powered applications have been deployed on the cloud for all government agencies throughout the city.
As part of a smart city initiative, Changsha, the provincial capital of Hunan, is utilising DeepSeek to examine real-time urban management data. Professors or specialists from state-owned businesses are also giving lectures to thousands of government officials and workers nationwide, explaining what DeepSeek is and how its technology can be applied.
The fact that DeepSeek’s open-source business model emerged at a time when Chinese enterprises were already searching for ways to use AI to transform their products is one factor contributing to its success. Its tools are also user-friendly and reasonably priced.
Paul Triolo, the China practice and technology policy lead at consulting firm DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group, wrote in a blog post that “Chinese companies experimenting with deployment of AI models for business operations were primed for the release of such a capable open source/weight model, which dramatically lowers costs for deployment.”
For instance, as competition among Chinese electric vehicle manufacturers has increased in recent years, automakers have been compelled to continuously create innovative features that may dazzle consumers—a task that DeepSeek’s models are well-suited for.
While “requiring lower compute costs, which means lower hardware cost,” DeepSeek provides “a better and faster interactive experience,” according to Lei Xing, a Chinese-market auto expert and former editor of China Auto Review.
Thanks to the technology, electric vehicle firms may quickly create sophisticated smart assistants without paying for the upfront research and development costs that are often involved.
Liqian Ren, a quantitative investment specialist at WisdomTree, asserts that many Chinese businesses are merely capitalising on the attention wave.
According to her, investors frequently fluctuate sharply from extremely positive to extremely negative emotions, and the Chinese equity market is still mostly influenced by public opinion rather than real company performance. Businesses may easily create media attention and attract investors by implementing DeepSeek’s methods.
However, the West’s panic over DeepSeek has also helped boost its popularity in China.
According to Angela Huyue Zhang, a law professor at the University of Southern California who specialises in Chinese technology policy, “Its positive reception abroad has further boosted its popularity in China, serving as the firm’s best marketing campaign.”
China’s national pride has grown as a result of the notion that DeepSeek is undermining American dominance in AI. The creation of resource-efficient models, perceived as a direct reaction to US policies intended to deny China access to advanced semiconductors, is a key component of the company’s heroic founding myth.
In a speech on March 7, China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, said, “Where there is blockade, there is breakthrough; where there is suppression, there is innovation.”
He also likened DeepSeek to China’s earlier technological innovations in fields such as space exploration and nuclear weapons development.
According to Ren, DeepSeek became a symbol of the potential of China’s AI business in the era of geopolitical tensions with the United States because of the international response to the company, which was initially stronger than the local response in China.
“In light of the chip sanctions, many understand China can catch up, which gives many Chinese citizens more confidence. And for that reason, I believe DeepSeek’s models had a greater influence than those of Alibaba, ByteDance, or Baidu,” Ren concluded.