Recently, Zhipu AI and Huawei jointly announced the open-source of the new generation image generation large model GLM-Image. The model not only achieves the current international leading level (SOTA), but also sets a key record: the world's first multimodal large model that completes the entire process from data processing, training to inference based entirely on domestic AI chips.
According to the information, GLM-Image was fully built using Huawei's Ascend Atlas 800T A2 server and the MindSpore AI framework, completely freeing itself from reliance on foreign GPUs and deep learning frameworks, verifying the feasibility and maturity of the domestic software and hardware stack in supporting cutting-edge AI research and development.
In terms of technology, GLM-Image adopts Zhipu's self-developed "autoregressive + diffusion decoder" hybrid architecture, cleverly combining the logical coherence of language modeling with the high-fidelity generation capabilities of diffusion models. This design enables it not only to accurately generate high-quality images based on text, but also to achieve deep semantic alignment and joint reasoning between text and images, providing a core engine for the emerging paradigm of "cognitive generation." This technical approach is being applied to next-generation AI creation platforms such as Nano Banana Pro, driving AIGC from "pixel stacking" to "semantic-driven" generation.
This collaboration marks the transition of the domestic AI ecosystem from "functional" to "user-friendly." In the past, high-performance multimodal models almost entirely relied on NVIDIA GPUs and the PyTorch/TensorFlow ecosystem; now, the successful training of GLM-Image proves that the full-stack domestic solution based on Ascend and MindSpore has the capability to support cutting-edge research and industrial applications.
Against the backdrop of intensified Sino-US technological competition, and the national strategy of controllable computing power, the release of GLM-Image is not only a demonstration of technical achievements, but also a key step in the collaborative innovation of China's AI industry chain. As more developers carry out fine-tuning and application development based on this model, a truly independent, open, and high-performance Chinese multimodal ecosystem is expected to take shape rapidly.
