ChatGPT creator OpenAI warned last week that Chinese companies were actively attempting to replicate its advanced AI models.

"No, we have no plans to sue DeepSeek right now. We are going to just continue to build great products and lead the world with model capability, and I think that will work out fine," Altman told reporters in Tokyo.

"DeepSeek is certainly an impressive model, but we believe we will continue to push the frontier and deliver great products, so we're happy to have another competitor," he also reiterated.

"We've had many before, and I think it is in everyone's interest for us to push ahead and continue to lead."

DeepSeek's performance has sparked a wave of accusations that it has reverse-engineered the capabilities of leading US technology, such as the AI powering ChatGPT.

OpenAI has said rivals are using a process known as distillation in which developers creating smaller models learn from larger ones by copying their behaviour and decision-making patterns -- similar to a student learning from a teacher.

But the company is itself facing multiple accusations of intellectual property violations, primarily related to the use of copyrighted materials in training its generative AI models.