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DeepSeek recruits former Jane Street engineer to catch up on AI agents, revenue race

Move underscores start-up’s efforts to build harnesses – software that turns an AI model into a functional and autonomous AI agent

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Job postings have suggested that the harness team would be a core unit within DeepSeek. Photo: Shutterstock
Vincent Chow
Chinese artificial intelligence heavyweight DeepSeek has recruited a former Jane Street star engineer to its new AI “harness” team, as it looks to ensure it does not fall behind in the agentic AI era.

Cui Tianyi joined the Hangzhou start-up in March, according to a post on his LinkedIn profile on Tuesday, after four years at Hong Kong-based quantitative trading firm TSY Capital, which he co-founded in 2022.

The engineer previously spent nearly nine years as a software developer and researcher at renowned US quant trading firm Jane Street in Hong Kong, working across equities and fixed income.

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Cui’s arrival underscores DeepSeek’s efforts to develop AI harnesses – the key software infrastructure that turns an AI model into a functional and autonomous AI agent.

The importance attached to AI harnesses has grown after Claude Code’s source code leaked in late March, underscoring the crucial role of the software infrastructure in building powerful agentic AI products. Photo: AP
The importance attached to AI harnesses has grown after Claude Code’s source code leaked in late March, underscoring the crucial role of the software infrastructure in building powerful agentic AI products. Photo: AP
AI harnesses have emerged as a major focus area for US and Chinese tech giants as powerful AI agents like Anthropic’s Claude Code have surged in popularity this year, delivering exponential revenue growth for their developers.
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