'Nvidia is digging its own grave': DeepSeek CEO backs China's AI chip push

DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng has laid out an unusually ambitious vision for the Chinese AI company: focus on artificial general intelligence (AGI), keep commercialisation secondary and help build an AI ecosystem less dependent on Nvidia. His remarks emerged from a lengthy discussion with investors and offer a rare look at how the normally low-profile entrepreneur thinks about the global AI race. While companies across the industry are spending heavily to turn AI into profitable products, Liang said DeepSeek's main objective remains AGI broadly referring to AI capable of performing intellectual tasks across many areas at or beyond human level.

DeepSeek wants the 'watermelon', not the 'sesame seeds'

Liang compared near-term revenue opportunities with “sesame seeds”, suggesting DeepSeek will pick some up without allowing them to distract the company from a much bigger prize. “Our goal should be AGI,” he said. The philosophy does not mean DeepSeek will ignore commercial opportunities. Rather, Liang argues that building more advanced intelligence should take priority over maximising revenue from today's products. He described AI development as a staircase. Language models provide the foundation for reasoning, reasoning enables more capable agents, and future systems could eventually learn and improve continuously. If an AI system can help develop its own successor, Liang believes progress could accelerate dramatically.

Why Liang thinks Nvidia is 'digging its own grave'

Perhaps his most provocative remarks concerned Nvidia. US restrictions have limited Chinese companies' access to some of Nvidia's most advanced AI hardware. But Liang argues that those restrictions are creating a powerful incentive for China to develop alternatives. “If Nvidia cards can't be bought, everyone is forced into it everyone has to do domestic chips,” he said. Liang went further, saying he believes “Nvidia is digging its own grave” by creating conditions that encourage Chinese companies to reduce their dependence on its hardware. DeepSeek is working closely with Huawei and expects to participate deeply in its AI computing ecosystem.

Can Huawei really replace Nvidia?

Liang's comments should not be mistaken for a claim that China has already eliminated Nvidia's technological advantage. He acknowledged a substantial efficiency gap, saying roughly four Huawei chips may be needed for the work of one comparable Nvidia chip, while China's hardware remains about two years behind. His broader argument is about direction rather than today's outright performance. DeepSeek has already demonstrated an interest in designing its software around hardware limitations. Its researchers have previously detailed how DeepSeek-V3 was trained using 2,048 Nvidia H800 GPUs while relying on several hardware-aware efficiency techniques. Liang believes the same pressure could ultimately produce a broader Chinese AI ecosystem built around domestic chips, open models and lower prices. That would turn Washington's restrictions into something of a long-term gamble: limiting China's access to America's best AI hardware today could also give Chinese companies a powerful reason to make sure they need less of it tomorrow.