Iflytek’s AI model accepts voice recognition prompts. Credit: Gerd Altmann from Pixabay.

Chinese voice recognition company iFlytek has joined the race to build a rival to ChatGPT, reported Bloomberg.

Iflytek chairman Liu Qingfeng unveiled the AI chatbot, called SparkDesk, which accepts voice recognition prompts.

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The company’s artificial intelligence (AI) model for business and educational use cases was demonstrated live at an event in Hefei City.

During the demonstration, SparkDesk was asked to evaluate student essays and generate hypothetical accounts about Confucius’ attendance at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 in both Chinese and English.

The audience also gave prompts during the demonstration.

According to Liu, Iflytek aims to outperform the Chinese capabilities of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, and match the chatbot’s English standards.

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“The impact of this generative AI technology is no less important than that of the birth of the PC or the internet,” Liu was quoted as saying at the event on Saturday.

“We need to do our best to learn from ChatGPT,” he added, “and even seek to surpass it.”

The development comes even as the Chinese authorities have hinted at more regulation of the AI industry.

Recently, the country’s top internet regulator released preliminary guidelines that would require a security check for generative AI services to be able to operate.

Officials in China’s Politburo meeting last month emphasised the importance of both developing generative AI and mitigating potential risks.

Additionally, Chinese companies are worried about their access to high-end chips for language models in the long term.

In 2019, Iflytek was blacklisted by the US Commerce Department, which prevented it from purchasing crucial US components, allegedly due to its involvement in the surveillance of minorities in Xinjiang.

Last month, China Telecom joined the AI fray by launching a language model to build its ChatGPT-like service.