en.Wedoany.com Reported - Chinese artificial intelligence company Zhipu AI has drawn significant attention in the global AI model competition with its newly released large language model "GLM-5.2." Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Zhipu AI's founder engaged in a public discussion about when Chinese AI models could catch up to Anthropic's latest flagship model, "Claude Fable 5."
Zhipu AI founder and chief scientist Tang Jie predicted that Chinese AI models could rival Anthropic's Fable 5 within this year. When Musk estimated that a Chinese model capable of matching Fable 5 would emerge in the first quarter of next year, Tang countered that it would not take that long. This exchange came against the backdrop of Zhipu AI's recently released GLM-5.2, which has performed exceptionally well in global benchmark tests. GLM-5.2 is a large model with 744 billion parameters, ranking second globally in the front-end coding capability ranking of the benchmark testing organization Code Arena, trailing only Anthropic's Fable 5.
In the Intelligence Index by market research firm Artificial Analysis, Zhipu AI was rated as the world's third-largest AI research institution, behind only Anthropic and OpenAI. This marks the first time a Chinese AI model has entered the global top three. Investment bank Jefferies, in a recent report, called GLM-5.2 "a milestone for Chinese AI," highlighting its key advantages: a 1 million token context window, coding capabilities, and long-term autonomous workflow processing abilities.
Musk acknowledged that Chinese models might soon catch up to Fable 5 in standardized benchmark tests, but he emphasized that achieving practical utility in real-world work environments that customers are willing to pay for is a higher bar. This means that, compared to benchmark rankings, the commercialization ability to enhance enterprise customer productivity and application levels is the core of AI model competition. Musk commented that even by this standard, a Chinese model approaching Fable 5's level by the first quarter of next year would be an impressive achievement. Musk also used this standard to explain the growth context of Anthropic: the practical utility customers experience in real work is translating into revenue. He said that Anthropic's "focus on maximizing useful intelligence is also reflected in its revenue."
Against this backdrop, Zhipu AI's rise is also being interpreted as intertwined with the trend of the U.S. tightening controls on Chinese AI. Earlier this month, Anthropic announced it would restrict queries related to scientific and frontier AI research to the lower-performing Opus 4.8 model, and subsequently banned all users from accessing Fable 5, citing U.S. government national security concerns. Tang Jie immediately released GLM-5.2 on the X platform after Anthropic's restrictive measures, stating that the model is fully open. As U.S. tech giants strengthen closed models and access restrictions, Chinese AI companies are expanding their influence through open-weight strategies.
The capital market has reacted sensitively. Morgan Stanley, in a recent report, predicted that Zhipu AI's revenue this year will grow by more than 534% year-over-year, while also revising its previous net loss expectations, suggesting the company could achieve profitability by 2028. Shares of Zhipu AI, listed in Hong Kong under the name "Knowledge Graph Technology," surged as much as 42% during intraday trading on the 22nd, reaching 2,980 Hong Kong dollars, before closing up 15.1% at 2,410 Hong Kong dollars. Since its listing in January this year, the stock's cumulative gain has exceeded 1,700%.
Industry insiders believe this debate is not just about model ranking competition but also reveals the shifting landscape of AI hegemony between China and the U.S. The U.S. is attempting to maintain its technological advantage by restricting access to cutting-edge models and AI chip exports, while China is seeking a way forward by improving its own models and expanding the open-source ecosystem. Tang Jie stated: "Frontier intelligence belongs to everyone. All we need is focus, especially on the true essence of intelligence."
