DeepSeek tops US corporate adoption list as cheaper AI alternative

According to a report from Ramp, a corporate spending platform based in New York, DeepSeek, a Chinese AI model, has emerged as the leading software vendor among US companies. The platform monitors initial business purchases, and DeepSeek surpassed competitors like event-management tool PheedLoop and open-source model-serving platform Fireworks AI. Ara Kharazian, the lead economist at Ramp Economics Lab, pointed out that US firms are making direct payments to DeepSeek, exchanging data with servers located in China, which suggests a preference for more affordable Chinese alternatives to OpenAI and Anthropic. This isn't DeepSeek's first surge in popularity; Kharazian noted a slight increase in US corporate adoption to 0.3% in January 2025, which later fell to 0.1%. By April 2025, adoption remained at 0.1%, while Anthropic and OpenAI led the Ramp AI Index with 34.4% and 32.3%, respectively. Ramp did not disclose market share figures for June.