The tech giants vow to barrel ahead despite the jolt from China’s DeepSeek.

Chinese startup DeepSeek claims to offer competitive AI models at lower costs, raising doubts about U.S. tech giants' investments in AI. Microsoft and Meta defend their significant spending, highlighting its importance for long-term strategic advantage amidst increasing demand for AI solutions.

Microsoft MSFT.O has made Chinese startup DeepSeek's R1 artificial intelligence model available on its Azure cloud computing platform and GitHub tool for developers, the U.S. company said on Wednesday. The AI model will be available in the model catalog on the platforms and will join more than 1,800 models that Microsoft is offering.

Alibaba says the latest version of its Qwen 2.5 artificial intelligence model can take on fellow Chinese firm DeepSeek's V3 as well as the top models from U.S. rivals OpenAI and Meta.

Microsoft Corp. said Wednesday that its profit for the October-December quarter grew 10% from the same time last year as it works to capitalize on the huge amounts of money it has spent to advance its artificial intelligence technology.

Microsoft Corp. said its cloud-computing business will continue to grow slowly in the current quarter as the company struggles to build enough data centers to handle demand for its artificial intelligence products.