Analysis ·
China offers salaries of one million yuan for the AI engineer also sought by Anthropic and OpenAI
Original title, in Spanish: “China ofrece sueldos de un millón de yuanes por el ingeniero de IA que también buscan Anthropic y OpenAI”
- Publication
- Xataka (Spain)
- Author
- Eva R. de Luis
- Published on
- 1 November 2026 · read in the page structured data
Summary
Major Chinese technology companies, including ByteDance, Tencent and Alibaba, are offering up to one million yuan a year (around €134,000) to forward-deployed engineers (FDEs), engineers responsible for adapting AI to clients' practical needs. This salary is 4 to 10 times the industry average, according to official Chinese figures. A Maimai report notes a 1,523% rise in searches for this profile over seven months. The article links this demand to a underlying finding: according to Apollo Global Management, AI is not yet generating a measurable return on investment in business, and according to an MIT study, only 5% of custom AI tools reach production. The phenomenon also affects the United States, where FDE job postings have jumped 800% since 2025, with Google, OpenAI and Anthropic also recruiting for this profile; Anthropic is investing $100 million to train 10,000 of them.
Summary based on the full text of the article.
Read the article on Xataka →Figures cited
-
134,000 EUR
Annual salary offered for a forward-deployed engineer (FDE) in China
China, major Chinese tech companies, 2026
« Un millón de yuanes al año (unos 134.000 euros). »
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275,504 yuan
Average annual salary of IT technical professionals in sizeable Chinese companies (2025)
China, companies above a certain size, 2025
« según la Oficina Nacional de Estadística de China, en 2025 los profesionales técnicos del sector TI en empresas chinas de cierto tamaño ganaron de media 275.504 yuanes »
Source: Oficina Nacional de Estadística de China
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106,080 yuan
Average annual salary of all staff in these companies (2025)
China, companies above a certain size, 2025
« y el conjunto de su personal, 106.080 yuanes »
Source: Oficina Nacional de Estadística de China
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975,000 yuan
Maximum annual salary offered by Tencent for an FDE
China, Tencent, AI division
« Ofrece entre 35.000 y 65.000 yuanes al mes y 15 pagas, esto es: hasta 975.000 yuanes al año. »
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1,523 %
Growth in searches for the FDE profile over 7 months
China, first seven months of the year vs same period in 2025
« Un informe de Maimai (algo así como el LinkedIn de China) ha registrado un crecimiento en búsquedas de ese perfil de 1.523 % en los siete primeros meses del año frente al mismo periodo de 2025 »
Source: Maimai
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5 %
Share of custom enterprise AI tools that reach production
Companies, worldwide, June 2025
« El informe "The GenAI Divide" del MIT de junio de 2025 llegaba a la conclusión de que solo el 5% de las herramientas de IA empresariales personalizadas llegan a producción »
Source: MIT, "The GenAI Divide"
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800 %
Growth in FDE job postings in the United States since 2025
United States, since 2025
« los anuncios de forward-deployed engineer en EEUU crecieron un 800% desde 2025, según datos de Financial Times recogidos por Fast Company »
Source: Financial Times via Fast Company
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100,000,000 USD
Anthropic investment to train FDE engineers
Worldwide, until end of 2027, target of 10,000 engineers
« Anthropic ha anunciado una inversión de 100 millones de dólares para formar a 10.000 ingenieros de este tipo hasta finales de 2027. »
Classification
- Country
- China, United States
- Company size
- Large companies
- Industries
- Software vendors, IT services companies, telecoms · All industries, or industry not specified
- Companies
- Tencent (deploys AI), Apollo Global Management (study author), Palantir (cited), MIT (study author), Alibaba (cited), ByteDance (deploys AI), OpenAI (deploys AI), Anthropic (deploys AI), Maimai (study author), Google (deploys AI)
- Keywords
- forward-deployed engineer, enterprise AI deployment, productivity, AI recruitment, AI adoption, China
Entry written by Marsanne Studio from the cited article, with the help of an AI model (claude-sonnet-5). The rights to the article and its illustrations belong to Xataka and its author. Entry translated from French by Claude Sonnet 5.5.