China’s artificial intelligence companies have launched two new strategic alliances aimed at developing AI technologies that rely on domestic standards, as well as integrating AI into industrial applications, at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai, according to Reuters. The moves are designed to develop domestic AI standards and reduce reliance on American technologies as soon as possible.
The first coalition is called the Model-Chip Ecosystem Innovation Alliance, which unites leading makers of AI hardware — such as Biren Technologies, Huawei, Enflame, and Moore Threads, among others — and developers of large language models, including StepFun. The goal of the alliance is to form a groundbreaking ecosystem that links the entire technology stack from hardware and AI models to supporting infrastructure. One of the focuses of the coalition is to streamline and localize the development of AI hardware and software amid a limited supply of foreign hardware, such as high-performance Nvidia GPUs.
For now, it is too early to make guesses about what the Model-Chip Ecosystem Innovation Alliance can do and what it is capable of achieving. However, to have a chance of success, members of the group will have to seek standardization and interoperability. That said, expect the union to establish common protocols, interfaces, and frameworks between models, chips, and infrastructure to streamline development and reduce fragmentation within China’s AI ecosystem.
Chinese AI hardware companies use different architectures (Arm, PowerVR, custom instruction set architectures), which complicates low-level unification, so do not expect Huawei’s CANN to support processors not developed by Huawei.
However, developers can agree on standardized APIs and model formats, allowing LLMs trained by StepFun, or its competitors, to run across multiple backends with minimal friction. Also, companies can unify mid-level software stacks to enable model portability and compatibility across all local platforms. Developers will write models once (e.g., in PyTorch) and run them on any Chinese-made accelerator without major changes. In addition, this will promote a cohesive national AI ecosystem where all components — processors, compilers, frameworks, and tools — work together. In a unified environment, innovation can develop faster, and China’s AI industry becomes more resilient and competitive on the global stage, which is when it will be able to compete against the American AI industry.
The second initiative, known as the Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce AI Committeeaims to help integrate AI more deeply into industrial applications. This alliance unites such hardware and software companies as Iluvatar CoreX, MetaX, MiniMax, and SenseTime, just to name a few. Essentially, the alliance will function as a bridge between AI developers and industrial players, ensuring that cutting-edge models and systems actively power China’s industrial transformation.
Both alliances are meant not only to create a self-sufficient AI ecosystem in China, but also to streamline its development as well as the adoption of AI by the industry.
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