Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek has released a prototype of a more autonomous coding agent as it aims to challenge Anthropic's popular Claude Code.
The new open-source tool, called Super Agent, is designed to identify coding problems through developer conversations and suggest solutions without waiting for users to issue instructions.
-
Indian Markets Turning Corner After Two Tough Years, Says Sandeep Tandon -
NDTV Profit Ignite 2026: Experts See Opportunity In Equities, Stay Bullish For Long-Term -
Buy Right, Sit Tight Does Not Work for Individual Stocks, Says Dinshaw Irani -
'Worst Is Behind': Quant MF Sees Market Bottom, Flags 'Extreme Euphoria' In Midcaps -
India's Mutual Fund Industry Could Become A $1 Trillion Opportunity, Say Fund Managers -
'Foreign Investors Are Baraatis': Raamdeo Agrawal's Take On LTCG Tax -
Stay Invested Through Market Cycles: Raamdeo Agrawal at NDTV Profit Ignite -
Ramesh Damani Remains Bullish On India For Next 20-30 Years, Sees Bargains Amid Market Weakness -
CAS Came After A Long Consultation Process: SEBI Chairman Tuhin Kanta Pandey AT NDTV PROFIT IGNITE -
Aim To Cut FPI Onboarding Time From Mth To Five Days: SEBI Chairman Tuhin Kanta Pandey AT NDTV PROFI
This development marks another step in the intensifying competition between Chinese and American technology companies to build AI agents that are capable of automating complex professional tasks.
Also Read | Layoffs Are Rising In Tech, But These Skills Are Helping People Unlock Better Pay
ALSO READ: AI Boom Drives South Korea's Exports To 50-Year High, Chip Shipments Jump 259%
As reported by Bloomberg, DeepSeek's new Super Agent can proactively monitor group chats among software developers in order to identify feedback about coding issues and suggest possible solutions without being directly prompted. The DeepSeek Harness team announced the development in a post on Chinese social media platform WeChat on Saturday.
The new agent aims to “take as little human attention as possible, and give as much value as possible,” DeepSeek stated in a user manual on GitHub, Bloomberg reported.
Unlike conventional AI coding assistants that generally respond to specific user instructions, the new tool aims to make assistance more proactive by identifying problems as soon as they emerge in developer conversations.
Traditional AI coding assistants generally work on a prompt and response basis. A developer provides an instruction, asks a question or submits a coding problem, and the AI generates a response or solution. Super Agent aims to change this approach into a more proactive one.
DeepSeek's Harness Team And Anthropic
The new agent comes from DeepSeek's dedicated Harness team, which was established earlier this year. The team's focus is developing AI agents capable of taking on coding related services offered by leading American AI companies, including Anthropic, Bloomberg reported.
An AI harness is the software infrastructure or framework built around a large language model. It allows an AI model to interact with external tools, coordinate tasks and manage more complex workflows. It helps turn a model that can generate code into an agent that can undertake broader software development tasks.
Anthropic and other AI developers have been investing in such infrastructure to make their models more effective at coding and automating professional work.
Race Intensifies Between China And USA
The launch comes amid an increasingly competitive race between Chinese and American technology companies to develop more advanced yet affordable AI tools, Bloomberg reported.
Coding has emerged as an important area of competition, with companies attempting to build tools that can perform increasingly complex programming assignments.
DeepSeek's Super Agent is aimed at this emerging market, placing the Chinese startup in a more direct competition with Anthropic's Claude Code.
DeepSeek Raises $15 Billion Ahead Of IPO
The development also comes as DeepSeek strengthens its financial position to compete with established American AI companies.
According to Bloomberg, DeepSeek has raised approximately 100 billion yuan ($15 billion) in its latest fundraising round, making it one of China's largest ever fundraising exercises.
The Hangzhou-based startup increased its fundraising target multiple times, from an initial 50 billion yuan to 80 billion yuan before reaching the final amount.
Battery manufacturer Contemporary Amperex Technology and Tencent Holdings, the operator of WeChat, were among the biggest investors in the funding round, according to people familiar with the matter as cited by Bloomberg.
The fundraising is expected to strengthen DeepSeek's ambitions to compete globally with companies such as Anthropic and OpenAI as it moves towards a planned initial public offering.
However, the newly released Super-Agent remains a prototype rather than a fully commercialised coding product, with DeepSeek's public documentation describing it as research software rather than an official production-ready offering.
ALSO READ: This San Francisco Startup Pays Rs 1,900 Per Hour To Robot Dog Walkers For AI Training
Essential Business Intelligence, Sharp Market Insights, Practical Personal Finance Advice, Daily Fuel, Gold and Silver Prices and Latest Stories — On NDTV Profit.
