Chinese academic warns of innovation overhaul to prevent AI power decline

China must fundamentally overhaul its innovation ecosystem or risk losing technological sovereignty and national security in an existential AI “knockout game” with the US, a Chinese academic has warned.

Huang Ping, assistant dean of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen)’s school of public policy, said the country must strongly back open-source artificial intelligence (AI) to counter costly, closed-source American models and their market dominance.

China must also implement “unconventional” reforms in cultivating and funding AI talent, as well as shift foundational research from bureaucratic state universities to leading tech enterprises, Huang wrote in an online article published on Wednesday.

China’s foundational AI research and top-tier talent are confined within state-owned universities and public institutes. These, according to Huang, rely on rigid, top-down bureaucratic metrics that stifle the chaotic, boundary-pushing creativity required for true AI breakthroughs.

“The new system must position leading tech enterprises within each AI subsector as the primary drivers of talent cultivation and foundational research – completely breaking free from existing talent and scientific evaluation frameworks,” he said in the article published by GBA Review, a social media account run by the Institute for International Affairs, Qianhai, where he serves as deputy director.