China's Moonshot AI releases open-weight Kimi K3, rivaling top US models at lower cost

Published Jul 27, 12:32 PM UTC

Beijing-based startup Moonshot AI released Kimi K3, an open-weight AI model that rivals top US systems from OpenAI and Anthropic in performance while being significantly cheaper to run. The model beats Anthropic's Opus 4.8 and OpenAI's 5.5 in coding and general AI benchmarks, costing about a third of Opus 4.8. Its open nature allows global developers to download, modify, and run it for free. The release triggered a ~1% drop in the Nasdaq as investors sold shares in US chipmakers like Intel and Nvidia. US companies accused China of improperly harvesting data, but experts argue China's advances stem from genuine innovation under export controls. Xi Jinping emphasized AI as a field for international cooperation. Analysts warn that the perceived 6-12 month US lead may have collapsed faster than expected, though US labs are racing ahead with next-generation models.