Tencent Launches T1 AI Model Amid Tight Competition In China

Tencent, officially launched their latest artificial intelligence (AI) reasoning model, T1 (photo: x @yogiliman)

JAKARTA China's technology giant Tencent officially launched their latest artificial intelligence (AI) reasoning model, T1, on Friday night March 21, 2025. This move further tightens competition in China's increasingly crowded AI sector.

In an announcement via WeChat's official account, Tencent stated that T1 offers a faster response time and enhanced capabilities in processing long-text documents.

In addition, this model is claimed to ensure that the content logic remains clear and the text structure is neater, with a very low level of 'halusination' or error in the text generation.

The launch of the T1 model comes amid rising competitions in the AI sector in China, especially after DeepSeek introduced a model claimed to be able to rival or even surpass the performance of Western AI systems at a much lower cost.

Tencent has previously released a preview version of the T1 model through various platforms, including assistant AI Yuanbao. Now, the official T1 version comes with support from the Turbo S basic language model, which was announced late last month. Tencent claims that Turbo S is able to process queries faster than competitors like DeepSek R1.

In a comparison published by Tencent, T1 is claimed to outperform DeepSek R1 in several benchmarks for knowledge and reasoning.

Tencent's Big Investment In AI

Tencent is increasingly aggressive in investing in AI. On Thursday 20 March, the company announced plans to increase capital expenditure by 2025, following a large investment that has been made throughout 2024.

With the launch of the T1, Tencent further reinforces its commitment to becoming a major player in AI development in China, competing closely with companies such as DeepSek, Baidu, and Alibaba which are also continuing to develop their AI technology.