BEIJING (Reuters) -Chinese artificial intelligence startup Moonshot AI released a new open-source AI model on Friday, joining a wave of similar releases from local rivals, as it seeks to reclaim its position in the competitive domestic market.
The model, called Kimi K2, features enhanced coding capabilities and excels at general agent tasks and tool integration, allowing it to break down complex tasks more effectively, the company said in a statement.
Moonshot claimed the model outperforms mainstream open-source models in some areas, including DeepSeek’s V3, and rival capabilities of leading U.S. models such as those from Anthropic in certain functions such as coding.
The release follows a trend among Chinese companies toward open-sourcing AI models, contrasting with many U.S. tech giants like OpenAI and Google that keep their most advanced AI models proprietary. Some American firms, including Meta Platforms, have also released open-source models.
Open-sourcing allows developers to showcase their technological capabilities and expand developer communities as well as their global influence, a strategy likely to help China counter U.S. efforts to limit Beijing’s tech progress.
Other Chinese companies that have released open-source models include DeepSeek, Alibaba, Tencent and Baidu.
Founded in 2023 by Tsinghua University graduate Yang Zhilin, Moonshot is among China’s prominent AI startups and is backed by internet giants including Alibaba.
The company gained prominence in 2024 when users flocked to its platform for its long-text analysis capabilities and AI search functions.
However, its standing has declined this year following DeepSeek’s release of low-cost models, including the R1 model launched in January that disrupted the global AI industry.
Moonshot’s Kimi application ranked third in monthly active users last August but dropped to seventh place by June, according to aicpb.com, a Chinese website that tracks AI products.
(Reporting by Liam Mo and Brenda Goh, Editing by Louise Heavens)
