The Rachman Review The battle for AI supremacy
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Nov 13, 2025 Gideon Rachman chats with John Thornhill, Innovation Editor at the Financial Times, and Caiwei Chen, a China reporter for MIT Technology Review. They unpack the intense rivalry between the US and China for AI dominance. John highlights China’s innovative open models that enable rapid AI deployment. Caiwei discusses how China's infrastructure and government support may lead to broader societal AI applications. The conversation also touches on US chip export restrictions reshaping the AI landscape and the implications of regulatory approaches in both countries.
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Open Weights Power Rapid Adoption
- Open-weight models let developers download, inspect and adapt powerful LLMs cheaply and quickly.
- John Thornhill argues this enables faster mass application even if US leads on frontier models.
Efficiency As China’s Competitive Edge
- Chinese engineers focus on making models efficient so they run with fewer compute and less power.
- Caiwei Chen highlights this pragmatic engineering as a competitive edge under chip shortages.
Complementary Investments Multiply Returns
- Complementary investments, not just core AI, deliver the biggest economic gains from general-purpose technologies.
- John Thornhill says China's manufacturing base gives it an advantage applying AI to hardware and embodied systems.