model

However, according to Cal Fire, the models do not account for changes in vegetation due to recent wildfires, nor the home hardening and brush management communities have undertaken.

It blames the slump on a lack of new features in Apple's latest devices, and the fact a rumoured high-end Ultra 3 model never materialised.

The tech giant says it has sold more than 100m of these devices worldwide across various generations, with the issues specifically impacting the "second generation" model.

In the end the government said the Ventilator Challenge helped scale up the production of three existing models, and approved one new design by the medical devices firm Penlon.

"DeepSeek's rapid rise has triggered hostile reactions from some in the West," a commentary in the state-run Beijing Daily noted, adding that "the development environment for China's AI models remains highly uncertain".