I was on a panel yesterday that included an IT industry organization from a Global South country. The chairman spoke quite frankly and at length about how he was deeply grateful for open-source AI projects like DeepSeek, because without them there was a real risk of “AI apartheid.” It’s been a while since I’ve heard that fear expressed. I remember it being discussed before, but I don’t think I truly grasped how significant and real this concern was (hopefully no longer is) for developing countries.

He also made a point I’ve often emphasized: many developing countries use Chinese AI models simply because they’re affordable. It’s the only viable option economically. Up to 100x difference in pricing for negligible quality tradeoffs depending on your specific task.