China is increasingly limiting the movement of its top AI researchers, with some now requiring government approval to travel abroad. This marks a broader effort by Beijing to contain the brain drain in the AI sector, which has seen a surge in demand for talent to refine AI models. In March 2025, the Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese authorities advised top AI founders and researchers to avoid traveling to the U.S., signaling Beijing's heightened focus on AI as both an economic and national security asset.
The restrictions have intensified following Beijing's scrutiny of the Manus-Meta deal. China has barred Manus' co-founders from leaving the country while regulators investigate whether Meta's $2 billion acquisition of the startup violates foreign investment rules, according to The Financial Times. The co-founders are now exploring options to unwind the deal, including raising about $1 billion from external investors to buy back the company from Meta.
The AI race between the East and the West has narrowed significantly, with Stanford's latest index showing the performance gap between top U.S. and Chinese models shrinking to 2.7% as of March 2026, down from 31% in 2023. While the U.S. still leads in model quality and high-impact patents, China is rapidly catching up in publications, citations, and patent volume. In addition to travel restrictions, China plans to monitor U.S. capital flows into its top AI firms, requiring government approval for companies like Moonshot AI, StepFun, and ByteDance to accept American investment, as reported by Bloomberg in April.
Source: techcrunch
