Global AI race: DeepSeek gains ground in developing nations; Microsoft flags widening gap

Chinese AI startup DeepSeek is seeing rapid adoption across several developing countries, helping broaden access to generative artificial intelligence even as the overall gap between advanced and emerging economies continues to widen, according to a new Microsoft report.The report said global adoption of generative AI tools reached 16.3% of the world’s population in the three months to December, up from 15.1% in the preceding quarter, AP reported. However, AI adoption in developed economies — described by Microsoft as the “global north” — is growing at nearly twice the pace of adoption in developing countries.“We are seeing a divide and we are concerned that that divide will continue to widen,” Juan Lavista Ferres, chief data scientist at Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab, said. The analysis is based on anonymised telemetry data tracking global device usage.Countries that invested early in digital infrastructure and artificial intelligence continue to lead adoption levels, including the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, France and Spain. The findings broadly align with earlier surveys, including research by the Pew Research Center, which showed higher enthusiasm for AI in countries such as South Korea.Against this backdrop, the rise of DeepSeek — founded in 2023 — has played a significant role in expanding AI use across parts of the developing world. Microsoft researchers said DeepSeek’s free-to-use and “open source” models have lowered barriers to adoption, particularly in price-sensitive regions.When DeepSeek released its advanced reasoning model R1 in January 2025, claiming it was more cost-effective than comparable offerings from OpenAI, it drew attention across the global technology industry. Research co-authored by DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng and published in Nature later that year described the work as a “landmark paper”.Lavista Ferres said DeepSeek performs well on tasks such as mathematics and coding, but noted that it operates differently from US-based models on politically sensitive topics. “For certain type of questions, of course, they follow the same type of access to the internet that China has,” he said, adding that responses on political issues can differ significantly.DeepSeek offers a free chatbot across web and mobile platforms and allows developers to modify and build on its core engine. According to the report, the absence of subscription fees has “lowered the barrier for millions of users, especially in price-sensitive regions”.The report found that DeepSeek’s adoption remained limited in North America and Europe, where several governments have raised security concerns. Countries including the US, Germany and Australia have sought to restrict its use, and Microsoft last year banned its own employees from using the platform.By contrast, DeepSeek’s usage surged in China and in countries such as Russia, Iran, Cuba and Belarus — regions where access to US-based technology platforms is restricted. In many markets, its adoption was linked to being pre-installed or promoted on smartphones from Chinese manufacturers such as Huawei.DeepSeek’s estimated market share was about 89% in China, followed by Belarus at 56% and Cuba at 49%. In Russia, its share was around 43%, while in Iran and Syria it ranged between 23% and 25%. In several African countries, including Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Uganda and Niger, its market share stood between 11% and 14%.“Open-source AI can function as a geopolitical instrument, extending Chinese influence in areas where Western platforms cannot easily operate,” the report said.