China Tech Talk

Episode 26: Z.ai interview

This week, I had the chance to interview Lou from Z.ai. It was really a great conversation to talk to her about the work that they are doing there and how they look at developing newer models and her view toward AGI. I get the feeling of just incredible hard work that Zhipu is going through as part of their effort to produce the best models and products out there. You can see that with GLM-5.1, which I can attest to as being very good for programming. It can do a lot of thinking of solve problems. I get the sense that GLM models are now able to do some form of RSI (Recursive Self Improvement) where the models help improve or create new more powerful models. One thing that stand out to me about GLM models is their size. They are in the 750B param range which can still fit as Quantized models and run locally on boxes with really large VRAM. However, they are also large enough that they are competitive with larger models. I think there are probably some sacrifices that you have to make in a 750B param model vs 1.6T or 3T param models. It will be very interesting to see where Z.ai goes from here since they have now received a lot of funding since IPO which gives them a larger war chest to do the work that they need to do. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit tphuang.substack.com [https://tphuang.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

CrossOver Episode with Kyle Chan

This week, I had the pleasure of doing a crossover episode with Kyle Chan who X profile can be found here [https://x.com/kyleichan]. We discussed a wide range of topic related to all aspect of AI. We really had a fun time discussing the full scope of China’s supply chain vs other countries. If we look at things holistically, China is definitely building the same supply chain advantage in AI as it has in other industries. I would recommend everyone to read and listen to Kyle’s substack [https://www.highcapacity.org]. I’m sure I will be doing more stuff with Kyle in the future. There are a lot of interesting topics and trend that we are both seeing. AI is just the start and we can probably discuss EVs, renewables, batteries and other industries and supply chains in the future. You can see Kyle’s podcast of this episode here [https://www.highcapacity.org/p/podcast-china-and-ai-supply-chains]. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit tphuang.substack.com [https://tphuang.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 25: Embodied AI ecosystem

This week, I welcomed back Qian Yu on the show to talk about China’s AI (especially embodied AI) ecosystem. If you would like to know how Chinese entrepreneurs can start new AI robotics/embodied AI product, this would be a good episode to listen to. We also talked about World Model vs VLA, educational institutions involved in AI industry and some of the projects that we have seen recently like the Honor and Xiaomi humanoid robots. I talked about the difference between reinforcement learning in world model vs LLMs. How can you have recursive self improvement in real world models? And finally, we also talked about the recent Sugon rack innovation. How Chinese players leveraged domestic supply chain to create a high voltage rack that allows superior cooling to existing solutions. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit tphuang.substack.com [https://tphuang.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 24: Iran conflict's affect on global supply chain

This week, I welcomed back Dan Collins to talk about something that has come to the forefront since the start of the Iran conflict. We are really in a historically unprecedented disruption when it comes to supply chain and energy. What does it mean when this many “molecule” or “atom” get taken off the global market. What will that do to global prices of everything and shortages of things like food? That will cause huge disruptions everywhere. Near the end, Dan and I spent sometime just talking about where the Iran conflict is going at the moment. Always great to discuss something in traditional engineering and hard sciences with someone that have experience in this area like Dan. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit tphuang.substack.com [https://tphuang.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Episode 23: Initial look at Iran conflict

This week, I welcomed back my friend Snek [https://x.com/snekotron] onto the show to talk about what we are seeing so far in the Iran conflict. We tried to look at it from the view of how the conflict started, how it’s progressing and where it is going. We covered what Iran is likely getting from Russia & China in the form of intelligence and supply chain. We looked at the possible land invasion plans that’s been rumored. Since Snek is very familiar with both this conflict and the Russia/Ukraine conflict, we also talked about the parallels and similarities we saw in the two conflict. Finally, we went into the geopolitics a little bit based on what we think will play out in the region. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit tphuang.substack.com [https://tphuang.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]