Tencent’s chief AI scientist dismisses lag concerns, says race a ‘long-term game’

Yao Shunyu, the former OpenAI researcher now leading Tencent Holdings’ artificial intelligence model development, pushed back against concerns that the tech giant is slow in AI, arguing that the race is just beginning with massive untapped opportunities in coding agents and embodied intelligence. “AI is a long-term game, with the second half of the race just starting,” said Yao, chief AI scientist at Tencent, comparing the current state to the development of personal computers in the 1970s. Yao.