In a significant move that marks the growing collaboration between Chinese tech giants, Huawei has integrated DeepSeek's advanced AI capabilities into its native HarmonyOS ecosystem, specifically enhancing the Xiaoyi Assistant with cutting-edge language model technology.
Integration Details and Availability
Huawei has officially announced that its Xiaoyi Assistant app on HarmonyOS NEXT now supports DeepSeek-R1 integration. Users running HarmonyOS NEXT can access this feature by upgrading their Xiaoyi Assistant to version 11.2.10.310 or higher. The integration is accessible through the Discovery tab in the bottom navigation bar, where users can find DeepSeek-R1 Beta in the AI Agent Plaza.
Required Xiaoyi Assistant Version: 11.2.10.310 or higher
Technical Infrastructure and Cloud Support
The partnership extends beyond just the assistant integration. Huawei Cloud has launched DeepSeek R1/V3 inference services based on their Ascend cloud services. This development has been followed by support from other major Chinese cloud providers, including Tencent Cloud, Alibaba Cloud, and Baidu Intelligence Cloud, all of which have announced official support for DeepSeek's implementation.
Supported Cloud Platforms: Huawei Cloud, Tencent Cloud, Alibaba Cloud, Baidu Intelligence Cloud
DeepSeek's Growing Influence
DeepSeek has garnered significant attention globally, particularly with its R1 model featuring 671 billion parameters. The model has been praised for its high cost-effectiveness and performance comparable to OpenAI's offerings. The National Supercomputing Internet Platform has also begun deploying various DeepSeek models, including R1, V3, and Coder series, with more versions expected to roll out soon.
DeepSeek R1 Model Parameters: 671 billion
Current Limitations and Future Prospects
While the integration brings powerful AI capabilities to Huawei devices, some features are still in development. The network search functionality, which has been experiencing server capacity issues in the standalone DeepSeek app, is currently not available in the Huawei integration. Huawei's Terminal BG CTO has acknowledged the unexpectedly high usage volumes and mentioned ongoing efforts to expand server capacity to meet demand.