On March 26, 2025, Chinese AI startup DeepSeek made waves in the technology sector by releasing its latest large language model, DeepSeek-V3-0324, through the AI development platform Hugging Face. This upgraded model promises significant enhancements in coding abilities, mathematical problem-solving, and reasoning skills, positioning DeepSeek as a formidable competitor to established U.S. firms like OpenAI.
The release of DeepSeek-V3-0324 follows the company's earlier models, including the V3 launched in December 2024 and the R1 model introduced in January 2025. Each iteration has garnered substantial attention, with the R1 model's popularity leading to a temporary halt on new user registrations due to overwhelming demand.
DeepSeek-V3-0324 boasts an impressive 685 billion parameters, a notable increase from the 671 billion parameters of its predecessor, the V3 model. This expansion has been accompanied by substantial improvements in performance metrics across various benchmarks. For instance, the new model scored 59.4 on the American Invitational Mathematics Examination (AIME), a marked increase from the previous score of 39.6. In coding assessments, it achieved a score of 49.2 on the LiveCodeBench benchmark, reflecting a ten-point improvement.
These advancements have not gone unnoticed in the academic and professional communities. Kuittinen Petri, a lecturer at Häme University of Applied Sciences, praised DeepSeek-V3-0324 for its ability to generate a fully functional, mobile-friendly website with 958 lines of code. Additionally, Awni Hannun, a scientist at Apple Machine Learning Research, successfully ran the model on a 512-gigabyte M3 Ultra workstation, showcasing its efficiency and capability. Furthermore, Mathematics Olympiad gold medallist Jasper Zhang tested the model on an AIME 2025 problem and confirmed its effectiveness.
DeepSeek's rapid ascent in the AI landscape has sparked discussions about the potential for cutting-edge AI models to be developed at a fraction of the cost typically associated with U.S. tech giants like OpenAI and Google. The company's innovative Mixture-of-Experts architecture allows for scalable models that maintain high performance while reducing costs. This has led to speculation regarding the anticipated release of DeepSeek R2, which may arrive sooner than expected.
The competitive edge demonstrated by DeepSeek is particularly significant given the context of an ongoing AI race between the U.S. and China. The company has effectively challenged the notion that only U.S. firms can produce advanced AI technologies. In fact, DeepSeek's emergence has prompted investors to reassess the financial dynamics of AI development, leading to sell-offs in AI and tech-related stocks.
DeepSeek's success is underscored by its recent achievement of surpassing OpenAI's ChatGPT as the most popular free app on Apple’s U.S. App Store. This milestone not only highlights the model's growing influence but also reinforces the competitive stance of DeepSeek in the rapidly evolving AI landscape.
Moreover, the latest model offers enhanced Chinese writing proficiency and improved search capabilities in the Chinese language, further broadening its applicability. The model also addresses previous limitations in Function Calling, increasing accuracy and reliability.
As the AI sector continues to evolve, DeepSeek's advancements signal a significant shift in the landscape, where innovation is no longer confined to Silicon Valley. The company's ability to deliver efficient and cost-effective models places it at the forefront of global AI development.
In conclusion, DeepSeek-V3-0324 represents a pivotal moment in the AI race, showcasing the potential for emerging companies to challenge established players. With its impressive capabilities and market influence, DeepSeek is not just a player in the AI field; it is carving out a significant space for itself as a global leader in artificial intelligence.
