Durov Identifies Key Factors Behind DeepSeek’s Success

In a message celebrating the Chinese New Year, Telegram founder Pavel Durov highlighted the success of the much-discussed AI model DeepSeek and identified the reasons for this breakthrough.

“China’s progress in algorithm efficiency did not arise out of nowhere. Chinese students have long outperformed others in mathematics and programming at international olympiads,” he noted.

According to him, the Chinese education system surpasses the Western one. It encourages fierce competition among students, a principle “borrowed from the highly effective Soviet model.”

In most Western schools, public announcement of grades and student rankings is prohibited to prevent pressure and ridicule. Such measures demotivate the best students, Durov believes.

“Victory and defeat are two sides of the same coin. Eliminate the losers, and you eliminate the winners,” he emphasized.

As a result, many gifted children find competitive games more engaging than studies, as they can see each player’s ranking there.

Praising students regardless of performance may seem commendable, but reality will shatter this illusion after school ends.

“AI benchmarks demonstrating DeepSeek’s superiority are one such public ranking, and they are becoming more numerous. If the US secondary education system does not undergo radical reform, China’s growing dominance in technology seems inevitable,” Durov concluded.

Earlier, OpenAI head Sam Altman described the DeepSeek-R1 AI model as “impressive,” considering its capabilities for its price.

Previously, the startup was suspected of data theft from the developer of ChatGPT.