DeepSeek Approaches $50B Valuation After First Funding Round

DeepSeek is in talks to raise its first outside capital at a valuation that could reach $45 billion to $50 billion, according to reports that say China’s national chip and AI investment funds are lined up to lead the round, with Tencent and Alibaba also discussed as possible participants.

One report put the target at about $45 billion, while another said the ceiling could rise as high as $50 billion, a jump that would make the Hangzhou startup one of the most closely watched private AI companies in China.

The company has long presented itself as a research-first lab.

On its official site, DeepSeek says it is:

“专注于研究世界领先的通用人工智能底层模型与技术，挑战人工智能前沿性难题,” and its English homepage opens with “Into the unknown.”

The funding discussions signal a clear shift away from that approach.

Reuters reported that DeepSeek could raise $3 billion to $4 billion to expand computing capacity and improve employee benefits, after years of relying on its founder Liang Wenfeng’s quant hedge fund High-Flyer rather than outside investors.

DeepSeek did not immediately respond to comment requests, and the state fund and Tencent both declined to comment, according to the report.

The timing reflects how quickly the market around DeepSeek has changed.

Reuters said the company is losing ground to better-funded rivals such as ByteDance, Alibaba, MiniMax and Moonshot AI, all of which have drawn heavy private or public capital.

The same report said DeepSeek claimed last month that its next-generation V4 model “redefined the state-of-the-art” for open-source models, though outside evaluations still placed it behind the strongest U.S. and Chinese systems.

If the round closes near the reported range, DeepSeek would move from a cash-light research outfit to a state-backed AI contender with far greater spending power, at a moment when compute access, talent retention and domestic supply chains have become central to China’s race to build frontier models.