Sam Altman acknowledges DeepSeek as a formidable competitor and believes their emergence “boosts the morale” of OpenAI.
On January 28th, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman expressed his admiration for DeepSeek R1, the new AI model from the Chinese company DeepSeek, headquartered in Hangzhou. In his post, Altman called it an “impressive model, particularly in terms of what they can achieve at an affordable price.”
The creator of ChatGPT acknowledged that DeepSeek is a serious competitor and believes their presence is “motivating” for OpenAI. This, he says, will push OpenAI to accelerate the release of its upcoming products.
“We are definitely going to bring out much more advanced models, and it’s really exciting to have a new competitor! We will accelerate the rollout of some of our upcoming products,” said the CEO in his post.
As a Chinese AI startup, DeepSeek has quickly gained global recognition with its AI chatbot. The company claims that DeepSeek R1 is on par with models from American companies, such as ChatGPT from OpenAI, but at a lower cost. This product has disrupted the global tech market and changed the perception that developing stronger AI always requires more computing power.
Not only has Sam Altman praised DeepSeek, but DeepSeek R1 has also become a new sensation on app platforms. Since the beginning of 2025, the chatbot has appeared on the Apple App Store and Google Play, rapidly becoming the most downloaded free app on iPhones.
However, Altman countered that future AI development will not be able to reduce costs so easily. The OpenAI team believes that “computing resources are now more important than ever to succeed with our mission.”
Additionally, the CEO revealed that OpenAI is making significant progress in the development of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). “The world will want to use a lot of AI and will be amazed by the next generations of models coming out,” he wrote.
According to Bloomberg, DeepSeek’s emergence and rapid success have put significant pressure on OpenAI and its partners. In Japan, the stock of SoftBank, OpenAI’s strategic partner, fell by 4.7% on the morning of January 28th. SoftBank is currently working with OpenAI on a $100 billion project to build infrastructure supporting OpenAI in the U.S.
However, shortly after shaking up the global AI industry, DeepSeek was hit by a large-scale cyberattack on the night of January 27th. The company had to limit new user registrations while attempting to manage the fallout. DeepSeek confirmed the attack and stated that they were taking preventive measures to minimize potential losses.
