Last updated: November 13, 2025 by the editorial team
Author's): DrSwarnenduAI
Originally published in Towards Artificial Intelligence.
A full mathematical breakdown of the three architectural innovations that took $4.6 million past $500 million – with evidence, intuition, and a roadmap to understanding
I've spent the last 72 hours obsessively recreating the Kimi K2 architecture.
The article explains how the Kimi K2, designed by a Chinese startup, outperforms larger models such as GPT-5 in key AI tests while significantly reducing costs. Discusses the underlying mathematical and architectural innovations that enable Kimi K2 to operate effectively, including interleaved thinking, quantization, and specialized routing systems. The article highlights the importance of process over scaling in AI, suggesting that thoughtful design leads to more efficient models compared to simply increasing the number of parameters or computational resources.
Read the entire blog for free on Medium.
Published via Towards AI
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