China AI is moving the frontier. Here's who to know.
The labs matter, but the field is easier to understand once you can name the researchers, founders, and operators moving between them. Start here, then follow the lab and money trails.
Open reasoning models; cost discipline; efficient training.
A lab can look very different once you track who trained where, who founded what, and who now leads the model or product work.
The profile table is built for quick triage: who is worth remembering, why they matter, and which lab story they clarify.
After a person catches your eye, the lab pages and money views explain the institution, funding, and source trail around them.
People rankings
Who to remember, where they sit, and what they are known for. Atlas Score is a data-informed editorial signal for quick comparison.
Atlas Score is an editorial comparison score, not a scientific leaderboard. It weights visible research, systems work, leadership, founder signal, and field influence so readers can sort a messy public record quickly. Missing public information can understate people, so treat the score as a starting point for reading, not a verdict.
| Known For | Breakdown | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | DeepSeek | DeepSeek (founder & CEO, 2023-present) | 34 | ||
| 2 | Kimi | Moonshot AI / Kimi (founder & CEO, 2023-present) | 33 | ||
| 3 | Zhipu | Founded Tsinghua KEG Lab (2001) | 31 | ||
| 4 | Xiaomi | Xiaomi MiMo-V2 (Mar 2026) | 30 | ||
| 5 | Zhipu | Zhipu AI (co-founder & controlling shareholder, 2019-present) | 30 | ||
| 6 | DeepSeek | Head of Post-Training, DeepSeek | 30 | ||
| 7 | StepFun | StepFun co-founder & CTO | 29 | ||
| 8 | Qwen | Alibaba Cloud CTO | 29 | ||
| 9 | MiniMax | MiniMax (founder, chairman, CEO & CTO, 2021-present) | 28 | ||
| 10 | Tencent | ReAct framework (co-author) | 28 |