China's IT Giants Invade Silicon Valley... The War for Talent Poaching

Alibaba, ByteDance, Meituan Recruiting Talent in the US
Exploiting Semiconductor Regulation Loopholes to Access Advanced Chips

China's IT giants, hit hard by U.S. semiconductor chip regulations, are going all out to recruit artificial intelligence (AI) talent in Silicon Valley.

On the 18th (local time), major foreign media reported, "China's largest IT companies such as Alibaba, ByteDance, and Meituan have been expanding their operations base in California's Silicon Valley over the past few months," adding, "They are poaching top U.S. IT talent from local competitors who can contribute to gaining an edge in the generative AI race and generating revenue."

Reuters Yonhap News

This move is interpreted as part of efforts to overcome the U.S. semiconductor regulatory net against China. Chinese IT companies have been hit as the export of NVIDIA's AI chips, essential for AI model development, has been banned. However, there are no regulations on U.S. companies owned by Chinese tech firms accessing advanced AI chips through local data centers, creating an atmosphere accelerating the presence of Chinese tech companies in the U.S. In response, the Department of Commerce proposed a rule in January requiring cloud service providers to verify the identity of users training AI models and report their activities.

Alibaba, China's largest e-commerce company, is recruiting an AI team near Sunnyvale in Silicon Valley and is reportedly reaching out to engineers, product managers (PMs), and AI researchers from major U.S. tech companies, including OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT. Job postings on LinkedIn are also seeking U.S.-based applied scientists, machine learning engineers, and product marketing managers.

Sources said an Alibaba recruiter sent emails to IT professionals proposing job changes and informed them of plans to spin off the AI team as a separate startup. The AI team is expected to focus on Accio, an AI-based search engine being prepared by Alibaba International Digital Commerce Group.

EPA Yonhap News

Meituan, known as the Chinese version of 'Baedal Minjok,' has also entered a fierce talent recruitment battle. Sources explained that Meituan's management, recognizing that they were falling behind in the AI development race, has been building a team in Silicon Valley over the past few months. A former OpenAI researcher lamented receiving a flood of job offers from Chinese IT companies including Meituan and Alibaba.

Earlier, Wang Xing, CEO of Meituan, brought back co-founder Wang Huiwen to lead GN06, a next-generation AI team exploring AI-related business directions such as menu translation functions and virtual assistants. Sources revealed that some employees are splitting their working hours between Silicon Valley and China.

ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, is already considered to have established a solid AI presence in Silicon Valley. One research team is focused on integrating AI features into TikTok, and there is also a group researching the Doubao chatbot model alongside employees in China and Singapore. Baidu, which operates China's largest search engine, previously ran an AI research institute in Silicon Valley with hundreds of researchers working on voice recognition and autonomous driving. However, due to internal conflicts leading to key personnel departures and worsening U.S.-China relations, Baidu has significantly scaled back its U.S. operations.

Reuters Yonhap News