INTERVIEW & CEO | Joseph Chen and James Liu, Chairman and CEO of Oak Pacific Investment(OPI)
“China Excels in Engineering and Optimization”
“AI Infrastructure Polarization… A Golden Investment Opportunity”
By Sohyun Kwon, Head of E-Daily MarketIn Center | juddie@edaily.co.kr
A networking service created by graduates of China’s prestigious Tsinghua University later grew into the country’s largest social networking service (SNS). This is the story of Renren.
Looking back at its founding, the company’s origins resemble those of Facebook, which Mark Zuckerberg created for Harvard students. As a result, Renren was dubbed the “Facebook of China.” At its peak in 2012, Renren had 50 million monthly active users (MAUs). In 2011, it became the first Chinese SNS listed on the New York Stock Exchange, drawing significant attention.
Joseph Chen and James Liu, who co-founded this startup success story, transitioned into investors in 2017, founding Oak Pacific Investment (OPI). Their mission was to discover companies capable of creating a second “Renren legend.” They have since placed a particular focus on artificial intelligence (AI), which they believe will be the greatest technological innovation in human history.
Massive Innovation in AI… Hardware Is the Core
Joseph Chen, Chairman of OPI, stated, “AI has the potential to increase global per capita GDP by up to 100 times over the coming decades. Unlike the dot-com bubble, AI is not just digitizing existing industries but creating entirely new ones.”
He and his team identified hardware companies as the early winners of AI innovation. Chen explained, “During the dot-com era, infrastructure companies like Cisco and Lucent led the market before the bubble burst. However, giants like Amazon and Google eventually emerged, growing into trillion-dollar enterprises. In this current AI wave, the companies absorbing the most value so far are semiconductor firms.”
Chen believes that even though AI semiconductor maker NVIDIA has faced skepticism over whether it is overvalued, the company still holds strong growth potential. NVIDIA’s fiscal year 2025 revenue is expected to reach between USD 100 billion and USD 150 billion, a significant leap from the USD 60.9 billion recorded the previous year.
He added that AI software has relatively lower entry barriers compared to hardware. This point was proven by China’s DeepSeek, which managed to rapidly catch up with OpenAI using far less capital.
Chen noted, “It’s similar to the difference between humans and chimpanzees—in the end, the hardware, or the brain, makes a decisive difference. Hardware plays a critical role in executing functions in AI.”
As a result, Chen predicted that companies like Tesla could hold dominant positions in the robotics field in the future. He added, “That, too, is a hardware-centered business. The AI value chain is evolving in that direction.”
James Liu, CEO of OPI, acknowledged that while hardware currently holds a larger share within the AI ecosystem, software companies have also begun to generate actual revenue.
OpenAI, the developer of generative AI ChatGPT, recorded USD 3.7 billion in revenue last year, more than double the USD 1.6 billion it earned the previous year. Projections suggest that its revenue could soar to USD 12.7 billion this year. Meanwhile, Anysphere, the developer of the AI coding tool Cursor, achieved annual revenue of USD 100 million with just 20 employees and within two years of founding.
Liu emphasized, “Although the software sector may appear to have relatively low entry barriers, these companies are indeed generating revenue. With many enterprises eager to adopt AI, the key lies in determining which companies to partner with.”
U.S.–China Tech Decoupling… Polarization of AI Infrastructure
Chen and Liu’s perspective on the tech dominance rivalry between the U.S. and China has shifted recently after witnessing the disruption caused by the Chinese AI company DeepSeek.
Liu remarked, “Although China did not create core protocols like the Internet or TCP/IP, it demonstrated exceptional engineering capabilities when the Internet began to spread widely. This led to the rise of global tech giants like Tencent and Alibaba from China.”
He went on to emphasize, “China possesses outstanding competitive advantages in engineering and optimization, and DeepSeek is a prime example that proves this capability. Even with limited resources, it successfully drove innovation based on transformer models.”
Liu expressed his expectation that more AI innovations like DeepSeek and Manus will emerge from China. In fact, Baidu and Alibaba have also unveiled successive AI optimization achievements, sending shockwaves through the global market.
Chairman Chen predicted that the ongoing technological decoupling between the U.S. and China will result in a polarization of AI infrastructure. He stressed that China is building its AI ecosystem with notable efficiency, and for the U.S. to maintain its competitiveness, large-scale investment in talent and infrastructure is now imperative.
He said, “There was a time when I believed the U.S. would easily win the AI race, but seeing DeepSeek’s accomplishments has completely changed my perspective.” He added, “Now, the U.S. must start again from the ground up—from semiconductor manufacturing to large language models (LLMs)—and take an all-encompassing approach.” In this context, he believes that now is a golden opportunity to invest in early-stage AI infrastructure and software ventures.
Founders with Vision and Flexible Thinking Are Key
Both Chairman Joseph Chen and CEO James Liu, being former entrepreneurs themselves, emphasize that the primary criterion for investment is the founder.
CEO Liu stated, “Because we deeply understand the entrepreneurial journey, we’re extremely passionate about identifying and supporting promising founders at early stages.” He added, “We look for entrepreneurs with a strong future vision and the mental resilience to adapt flexibly to environmental changes.” He emphasized, “Startups are never easy—energy, passion, and perseverance are essential.”
Chairman Chen offered two pieces of advice for aspiring entrepreneurs. First, when forming a startup team, choose partners with complementary strengths. Second, build your team with people you’ve worked with for a long time. He explained, “Complementary skill sets and long-term trust form the foundation of a solid startup team.”
CEO Liu is scheduled to speak at the Global Alternative Investment Conference (GAIC) 2025, which will be held at The Plaza Seoul on May 29, where he will share investment insights in the Trump 2.0 era based on his experience as an entrepreneur.
Original Article: https://n.news.naver.com/mnews/article/018/0005984181?sid=101