WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Top executives at American AI giants OpenAI, Microsoft and Advanced Micro Devices said at a U.S. Senate hearing on Thursday that while the U.S. is ahead in the artificial-intelligence race, Washington needs to boost infrastructure and champion exports to stay ahead of Beijing.

The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, chaired by Republican Senator Ted Cruz, is looking to cut regulatory barriers to U.S. artificial intelligence after China’s DeepSeek shocked the world with a high-quality, affordable AI model last year.

The U.S. tech industry has seized on that development to lobby the Trump administration for more favorable policies including loosened export restrictions on AI chips, arguing that promoting worldwide use of AI that reflects democratic values is a matter of national interest.

“The number-one factor that will define whether the U.S. or China wins this race is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world,” said Microsoft President Brad Smith.

“The lesson from Huawei and 5G is that whoever gets there first will be difficult to supplant,” he said.

Chinese Manufacturer of AI Chip Faces US Restrictions

The Chinese telecommunications equipment manufacturer, which also makes an advanced AI chip, has faced U.S. restrictions over concerns its equipment could be used to spy on users. Reuters reported last month that Huawei is ramping up to make mass shipments of advanced AI chips to Chinese customers.

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, maker of flagship AI model ChatGPT, is testifying, as are Microsoft’s Smith and Lisa Su, CEO of AI chipmaker AMD. Microsoft is a major backer of OpenAI.

Altman told the panel he expects societal advances from AI to accelerate in the next few years through U.S. investment.

“Investment in infrastructure is critical,” Altman said during the hearing. The U.S. “will be not only the place where the AI revolution happens but all the revolutions after,” he said.

The development of AI has depended on specialized computer chips, huge amounts of data to train large-language models, vast amounts of energy and a technically skilled workforce.

Smith called for more education on AI to speed up adoption and investment in electrical infrastructure and AI research in development.

DeepSeek, a Hangzhou-based upstart, stunned the world last year when it unveiled a powerful AI model competitive with the likes of OpenAI and Meta Platforms, but cheaper to run.

The move was surprising against the backdrop of sweeping rules imposed by President Joe Biden’s administration, aimed at cutting off China from American AI chips and capabilities, over fears Beijing could use the powerful technology to supercharge its military.

The Trump administration has so far taken a similar approach, last month imposing new licensing requirements on shipments to China of AI chips made by Nvidia and AMD that the companies designed to get around prior export restrictions.

But the limitations have spurred criticism from industry participants and some lawmakers who say the rules hamstring U.S. companies and hand the lucrative Chinese AI market to companies like Huawei.

“The way to beat China in the AI race is to out-race them in innovation, not saddle AI developers with European-style regulations,” Cruz said in a statement announcing the hearing.

—

(Reporting by Alexandra Alper in Washington and Jody Godoy in New York; Editing by David Gregorio, Chizu Nomiyama and Matthew Lewis)