DeepSeek is the little-known (until this week) Chinese artificial intelligence start-up that has its American rivals, and US investors, on edge. Marc Andreessen, the veteran venture capitalist, has called it AI’s “Sputnik moment”.

What DeepSeek promises is a big leap forward compared with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. Could it be faster, smarter and use fewer resources? These four charts show why investors are so concerned about DeepSeek’s impact on the tech giants – and the broader market.