Chinese artificial intelligence start-up DeepSeek has updated its foundational V3 model and removed references to its reasoning model R1 from its chatbot, prompting speculation about a shift in the company’s research focus.
DeepSeek announced on Tuesday the release of the V3.1 model in a brief message to one of its WeChat user groups. The update expands the context window to 128k, allowing the model to hold more information – equivalent to a roughly 300-page book – during user interactions.
The company did not announce the update on its public social media channels, including its X account.
DeepSeek has also deleted references to the R1 model from its chatbot’s “deep think” feature, raising questions about the progress of its much-anticipated next-generation R2 model.
Founded by entrepreneur Liang Wenfeng as a side project of his quantitative trading firm, DeepSeek gained global attention with the launch of V3 in December and R1 in January, which spurred a wave of open-source AI adoption in China. However, the company has not disclosed its development timeline or plans for future models.