“Shark Tank” star Mark Cuban says the US can beat China at AI if it continues “investing in research of all kinds as a country.”
“The IP we create domestically is what the frontier models can buy or invest in to define their differentiation and advance forward,” Cuban wrote on X in response to a post by David Sacks, the White House’s AI and crypto czar, on the state of the AI race.
When asked about his X post, Cuban told Business Insider that American research is “important, not just because of the outcome of the research itself, but its value to American frontier AI models” like ChatGPT and Gemini.
Cuban said that any unique intellectual property produced can be “licensed to the models, for a fee, to be included in their training.” This would not only offset research costs but also make the models more valuable, he added.
“The quality and depth of the research we do in this country can help us stay ahead of China and other countries in the AI race,” Cuban told Business Insider.
“We need our Ph.D.s, our scientists, our experts, to stay here and contribute to society, and their IP to make American AI models the global leaders,” he added.
Since taking office in January, President Donald Trump’s administration has been culling research grants for universities and research institutions like the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
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Researchers and scientists told Business Insider’s Ayelet Sheffey in April that the cuts could stifle innovation and result in brain drain.
“It absolutely endangers the United States’ position as the global leader in medical research. And for that, we will pay,” Peter Lurie, a recipient of an NIH grant terminated in March, told Sheffey.
Staying ahead in the AI race has been a primary focus for the Trump administration, which unveiled its “AI Action Plan” last month. The 28-page plan calls for a light-touch approach to AI regulation compared to Trump’s predecessor, President Joe Biden.
In January, Chinese AI startup DeepSeek shocked the world with its high-performing but relatively cheap AI models. Trump said he viewed DeepSeek’s accomplishment “as a positive, as an asset” for America.
“The release of DeepSeek, AI from a Chinese company, should be a wake-up call for our industries that we need to be laser-focused on competing to win,” Trump told GOP lawmakers in January.
