The five unicorns of generative AI startups - Moon's Dark Side, MiniMax, Baichuan Intelligence, ZeroOne, and Zhipu AI, are both honored and facing an uncertain future.

To continue burning money to expand scale requires global capital support.

However, China's unique technology, finance, and security environment can no longer fully support global financing activities. Reports show that the total investment and financing in China's AI sector declined by 70% year-on-year in 2023.

Companies like "Zhipu AI" that have received foreign investment may face restrictions in developing specific domestic business areas at some later stage.

More important than money is the business scenario.

Large-scale business scenarios will overlap with the "big factory models" of major players like Baidu Wenxin, Ali Tongyi, Tencent Hunyuan, SenseTime Ririxin, iFLYTEK Spark, ByteDance Doubao, and Huawei Pangu. In terms of funds, technology, and talent resources, big players are more competitive and cost-effective.

Small-scale business scenarios, on the other hand, struggle to support existing valuations unless they can reuse model resources across multiple small scenarios, building a series of AI applications similar to ByteDance's "APP factory".

Robin Li has repeatedly suggested the industry to "compete in models" over the past year, likely based on this vision.

The good news is that in the foreseeable future, both big factory models and startup models will coexist for a long time.

As Jack Ma once said, there are only two reasons why talents leave a company: either they are not paid enough, or they are unhappy with their work.

Big companies can offer "a lot" of money but not "excessive" amounts, and their procedures and systems may inevitably make some talents unhappy. Not every large company can offer the same level of freedom as Pony Ma did to Zhang Xiaolong.

In summary, the opportunities for the five AI unicorns are still abundant, but there may be too many players.

So, among Moon's Dark Side, MiniMax, Baichuan Intelligence, ZeroOne, and Zhipu AI, which one do you favor?