Apple CEO Visits DeepSeek’s Hometown During China AI Revival

Screenshot of a video shared on Tim Cook's Weibo account of his visit to Zhejiang University in Hangzhou.

Source: Tim Cook/Weibo

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Apple Inc.’s Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook visited China’s artificial intelligence hub of Hangzhou, the home of AI sensation DeepSeek which shocked the world with its models built at a fraction of the cost of American rivals.

Cook met with “the next generation of developers” at the city’s elite Zhejiang University on Wednesday, he said in a post on his official Weibo account. Apple donated 30 million yuan ($4.1 million) to the university, the Cupertino, California-based company said in a statement. Its alumni include an array of tech executives, including DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng and Colin Huang of e-commerce giant PDD Holdings Inc.