MTS
America Is Losing the Open Source AI Race to China | Tom Lynch
Sep 4, 2026
About this episode
Tom Lynch joins MTS to discuss data center power constraints driving local AI adoption, the role of US intellectual property law in open-source model development, and the future distribution of global AI inference infrastructure. Check out our sponsor Lovable: https://lovable.dev. Turn ideas into software people love. MTS is a live news and interview show covering technology, business, politics, and culture as it happens. Follow MTS: X | https://twitter.com/MTSlive YouTube | https://www.youtube.com/@mtsituation Spotify | https://open.spotify.com/show/4HUNNmV1pjV7CW6Lphm1rM Apple | https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mts/id1891088763 Substack | https://mtslive.substack.com/ Interested in sponsoring the show? sponsors@mts.now -- Brought to you by: Mongo DB - Anyone can prototype an agent. Learn how to get them into production on September 30th in New York - register at https://www.mongodb.com/events/mongodb-local/nyc Lovable - Turn ideas into software people love with Lovable. Start today at https://lovable.dev/ Larridin - Finally prove what your AI investment is worth. Head to https://larridin.com/ today to start measuring your AI’s bottom line. Neon (by Databricks) - Get up to $100K in credits for your startup at https://neon.com/mts ElevenLabs - AI that communicates at human level across every channel and modality. https://elevenlabs.io/mts Arena - Measuring AI performance in the real world. https://arena.ai/ Kong - The AI connectivity platform. Connect APIs, LLMs, agents, and systems with serious security and governance. https://konghq.com Today’s stream is sponsored by VCX, the public ticker for private tech. Head over to http://getvcx.com to learn more Blitzy - Autonomous software development for enterprise codebases. Ship 5x faster. https://blitzy.com AdQuick - Make your brand a billboard. Out-of-home advertising as easy to scale as digital. https://adquick.com -- Timestamps: (00:00) Introduction (00:01:15) Cloud Renting Vs Local Inference (00:02:51) Data Center Power Bottlenecks (00:04:24) Dedicated Local Inference Hardware (00:07:35) Enterprise Adoption Of Open Models (00:11:13) Frontier Lab Cloud Incentives (00:16:41) Cyber Capabilities Of Swarm Models (00:21:08) US IP Law Suppressing Open Source -- Note : This podcast is not investment, legal, or tax advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. Hosts and guests may hold positions in the companies and securities discussed; do your own research before acting on anything you hear.