After more than 600 days since the release of ChatGPT by OpenAI, nearly 80,000 AI companies in China have had their registrations revoked or ceased operations, leading to a significant cooling down in investment enthusiasm.
According to a report by TechNode on August 13, TechNode AGI exclusively compiled data from the “National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System,” showing that from the release of ChatGPT on November 30, 2022, until the latest available data on July 29 of this year, the number of artificial intelligence (AI) companies in China that have newly registered but are now in abnormal states of revocation, deregistration, or closure has reached 78,612. Nearly 80,000 companies have disappeared, accounting for 8.9% of the total 878,000 companies newly registered during that period.
TechNode AGI also exclusively calculated that over the past three years, more than 200,000 AI-related companies have been revoked or ceased operations in China, with a total of 353,000 such companies disappearing over the past decade (including revocation, withdrawal, closure, liquidation, suspension, removal, compulsory closure, etc.). As of August 7, this year has seen the addition of 300,700 new AI-related companies.
Currently, there are 1.8043 million AI-related companies in China. Among them, official statistics show that there are over 4,500 companies related to the AI industry system, with over 180 large-scale generative AI service models that have completed filing and are online, capable of providing services to the public.
The report indicates that on one hand, influenced by the AI entrepreneurship boom, tens of thousands of new AI-related companies have emerged; on the other hand, due to challenges of reckless spending without profitability and a downturn in venture capital leading to a freeze in financing, nearly 80,000 AI enterprises have been successively eliminated.
The cooling down of financing in the Chinese AI industry is particularly evident. According to the “AI Industry Status Report” released by research firm CB Insights, in 2023, the number of investments and financing in the AI field in China was about 232 transactions, a 38% decrease compared to the previous year, with a total financing amount of about $2 billion, a 70% decrease year-on-year.
Sogou founder Wang Xiaochuan has previously stated that the future of the large-scale AI model market in China will be akin to a survival of the fittest, with possibly no more than 5 companies remaining in the top tier.