Which is the better investment: a big, established tech group at a relatively modest valuation or an unproven fledgling at hundreds of times forecast revenue? In China’s AI sector, many investors are plumping for the latter.
哪种投资更好：是估值相对适中的大型成熟科技集团，还是估值高达预期营收数百倍、尚未证明自身实力的初创公司？在中国人工智能领域，许多投资者选择了后者。
Shares in Chinese AI start-up Zhipu, listed as Knowledge Atlas Technology in Hong Kong, have more than quadrupled this year to give it a market value of almost HK$250bn, or over $30bn. Those in Minimax Group have more than doubled. Meanwhile, Alibaba and Tencent, local tech giants that are reporting record engagement across their AI platforms, are lower than where they started this year.
在香港上市的中国人工智能初创公司智谱(Knowledge Atlas Technology)的股价今年已上涨四倍多，市值近3000亿港元，合380亿美元。Minimax集团的股价也上涨了一倍多。与此同时，阿里巴巴(Alibaba)和腾讯(Tencent)这两家本土科技巨头，尽管其人工智能平台的用户参与度创下历史新高，但股价却低于年初水平。
That looks counterintuitive. It is true that AI start-ups are a pure-play bet on potentially groundbreaking technologies: Zhipu recently released its new flagship model GLM-5, which it says approaches Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.5 on some capabilities. And it is also true that the big established platforms’ heavy investment in AI infrastructure could pressure current margins before producing returns.
这看起来似乎有悖常理。诚然，人工智能初创公司是对潜在突破性技术的纯粹押注：智谱最近发布了其新的旗舰模型GLM-5，该公司称其在某些功能上接近Anthropic的Claude Opus 4.5。同样不可否认的是，大型成熟平台对人工智能基础设施的大量投资可能会在产生回报之前挤压其当前的利润率。