Following the incident where three people died in a rear-end collision involving an electric car under Huawei, the company is once again embroiled in scandal. There are reports circulating on the internet alleging that Huawei’s demonstration of its large-scale text-to-image model capabilities, known as “Wen Sheng Tu,” at a recent event may have been fabricated.
According to information from Southern Metropolis Daily and Sina Technology, images circulating on the internet show that during a recent Huawei event, a code “time.sleep(6)” appeared during the demonstration of the Wen Sheng Tu large-scale text-to-image model capability. Netizens believe that this code implies “artificially controlling the process from input to output, taking 6 seconds,” leading to suspicions that the text-to-image results were not generated by the large-scale model but manipulated by human intervention.
This incident has sparked discussions on platforms like Zhihu. Some opinions suggest that this is a case of Huawei’s fabrication during a high-tech product launch, accusing the company of using “time.sleep(6)” to simulate AI calculations, when in reality, they were showcasing pre-prepared results.
Facing the controversy, Huawei’s official response did not directly address the specific purpose of “time.sleep(6).” Meanwhile, the Ascend Community responded in the afternoon of the same day, stating that the images shown were generated in real-time and not preloaded pictures.
Public records indicate that Ascend is Huawei’s artificial intelligence computing chip. The Ascend Community’s official website introduces Ascend Computing Industry as a full-stack AI computing infrastructure, industry applications, and services built based on the Ascend series (HUAWEI Ascend) processors and foundational software which includes processors, hardware, CANN (Compute Architecture for Neural Networks), AI computing frameworks, application enablement, development tool chains, management and operation tools, industry applications, and services.
As the Chairman of Huawei’s Intelligent Vehicle Solution Business Unit, Yu Chengdong’s catchphrase “far ahead” was once listed among the top 10 internet buzzwords in 2023. However, under the strong sanctions from the United States, Huawei’s promotional slogan seems to have been discontinued.
According to reports from Titanium Media on April 2, founder of the media Zhao Hejuan revealed in her column that Ren Zhengfei had to impose a “ban” on Yu within Huawei, with a penalty of ten thousand for each mention of “far ahead.”
Yu Chengdong had a public spat with He Xiaopeng, Chairman of XPeng Motors, in November last year. He Xiaopeng questioned the AEB technology of Huawei’s Seres M7, stating, “99% is fake, it’s all fabrication, those promotions aren’t officially released by the company, all come from short videos. Our team also checked, its AEB can’t work, there are too many instances of braking mistakes on the road.”
On April 26, a rear-end collision involving a Seres M7 under Huawei resulted in the death of three people, attracting public attention recently. The “stabilization” efforts by Huawei have stirred up controversies, not only being able to manipulate the testimonies of the victims’ families but also swiftly pulling down a mainstream financial media in mainland China after exposing various flaws in the Seres M7.
Huawei has long received high-profile propaganda and support from the Chinese authorities. In recent years, Chinese tech companies like Huawei have faced sanctions from the United States and been added to the American blacklist.
On Tuesday (May 7) this week, the US Department of Commerce announced the revocation of some export licenses for chips to Huawei. On Wednesday, Intel and Qualcomm confirmed that their products are included in the new ban.
Additionally, on May 1, officials from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) told Reuters that the commission is taking action to prevent certification of wireless devices from companies like Huawei, ZTE, and others believed to pose a threat to US national security.
In 2020, the FCC designated Huawei and ZTE as threats to national security in communication networks, thereby prohibiting US companies from using government funds to purchase equipment from these companies.