America is very behind China in open weight model development.
Alex Atallah states bluntly that America is 'very, very behind' China in open weight model development, though he notes some US labs like Poolside and Thinking Machines are beginning to catch up. ✦ AI generated
Alex Atallah · 20VC · 2026-08-10 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 30:39
“Do you think we should be concerned by the rate and quality of Chinese open models?”
We should. We're behind. I America is very, very behind still. Um I think things are picking up. I and I think I think um you know, we we have Poolside, we have Thinking Machines, we have RC.
verbatim transcript · starts at 30:39
30:39founders to make new labs. Um and the and if like oh if American open weight models pick up in steam, then it gives these NeoLabs a base to train on. That's not Chinese. Um which will then probably create more American NeoLabs. >> Do you think we should be concerned by the rate and quality of Chinese open models? >> We should. We're behind. I America is very, very behind still. Um I think
31:11things are picking up. I and I think I think um you know, we we have Poolside, we have Thinking Machines, we have RC. >> Do you feel a sense of responsibility for that? And what I mean by that is like you know, you are routing business and you could route a company to a Chinese model that who knows people are worried about backdoors, Chinese ICCP involvement. You could be the