Open-Weight AI Race Shifts to China as U.S. Labs Scale Back
Hugging Face’s Summer 2026 report shows Chinese labs now publishing the largest open‑weight models—up to 2.8 trillion parameters—while U.S. firms focus on hardware‑optimized releases. With 85 % of repositories barely downloaded, a tiny elite drives most usage, marking a strategic shift toward size‑as‑signal and chips‑as‑showcase.