In 2023, smartphones-to-silicon conglomerate Huawei quietly released its flagship Mate 60 Pro handset. The launch, while muted, was worth celebrating in the People’s Republic: the device featured a made-in-China chip that had previously seemed out of reach amid crippling U.S. sanctions. Late last month, Hangzhou-based startup DeepSeek added the latest technological surprise by claiming to have trained a large language model on a par with the offerings of OpenAI and Meta Platforms at a fraction of the cost.