AsianFin -- The progress of AI startup DeepSeek highlights the rise of Chinese companies in the artificial intelligence (AI) sector, a spokesperson for China's parliament remarked on Tuesday.

Lou Qinjian, addressing a question about China’s AI advancements, praised the achievements of DeepSeek's young team as "commendable." He emphasized that DeepSeek's commitment to an open-source model and its global promotion of AI technology represented a significant contribution of Chinese innovation to the world.

"Through the emergence of companies like DeepSeek, we witness the innovation and inclusiveness driving China's technological development," Lou stated.

DeepSeek, a prominent AI startup, has gained significant attention in China for shaking up the global tech industry by launching AI models at a fraction of the cost of those developed by U.S. competitors like OpenAI.

While some countries, including South Korea and Italy, have removed DeepSeek’s chatbot from national app stores due to privacy concerns, the company has been widely adopted in China, where both local governments and tech firms are integrating its technology into their systems.

The Hangzhou-based company is rapidly advancing the launch of the successor to its January R1 model, according to a Reuters report last month.