Bloomberg reported on October 22,DeepSeek Approximately completed $1.5 billion (approximately RMB 10 billion)funding round—the largest single financing round in China in recent years—with potential investors including CATL and Tencent. This occurred just two days after the U.S. ordered federal civilian agencies to fully remove DeepSeek technology.
This timing is no coincidence: one side faces expulsion from the world’s largest government procurement market, while the other secures backing from China’s two wealthiest capital sources—industrial capital (a battery industry leader) and traffic capital (WeChat).DeepSeek is shifting its focus entirely back to the domestic market.
Valuation trajectory: more than doubled in six months
- June: raised over $7 billion, valuation $50 billion
- July: Reportedly seeking an additional $1.5 billion in funding, with a valuation of approximately $71 billion
- October: This round amounts to approximately $15 billion, with the valuation undisclosed; if extrapolated from the previous round, it is likely already above $70 billion
- Plan: To launch an IPO domestically as early as next year
Liang Wenfeng still holds approximately 81.6% of the shares in the China operating entity through prior financing structures (WireScreen’s calculation based on business registration data). This percentage signifies one thing: despite raising such substantial funds, control has not been diluted at all—exactly the opposite of OpenAI and Anthropic, whose founding teams have seen their equity progressively diluted across funding rounds.
Why investors dare double down amid the ban
First, what happened in the U.S.: In mid-October, federal civilian agencies were ordered to fully remove DeepSeek technology—even third-party services embedding it were affected. We previously covered this—U.S. federal agencies comprehensively banned DeepSeek.
Logically, this should be the worst possible timing—but domestic capital sees it differently:As overseas markets close one door, the domestic market gains an even stronger imperative for self-reliant development.DeepSeek Its open-source weights have been widely deployed on-premises by Chinese enterprises; the ban, ironically, has cemented its “domestic alternative” label even further. Industrial players like CATL seek inference capabilities embedded directly within their own production lines and supply chains, while Tencent seeks tight integration between models and traffic entry points—neither relies on overseas revenue for financial justification.
Viewed within China’s AI funding landscape
| Company | Most recent funding / valuation | Remark |
|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek | Approximately $15 billion raised, with a valuation exceeding $70 billion | Plans domestic IPO next year |
| Moonshot（Kimi） | $2 billion funding round, $20 billion valuation | Completed in May, focusing on overseas cloud channels |
| Manus | Funding exceeding $500 million | This month, resuming independent operations |
| Zhipu Z.ai | Listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, market cap ~$29 billion | IPO in January |
| MiniMax | Listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, market cap ~$7.2 billion | IPO in January |
Horizontally speaking,DeepSeek The amount raised in its single funding round exceeds that of the second-place company by an order of magnitude—but its valuation is not the highest; Zhipu’s market cap in the secondary market is actually higher.This indicates that pricing in the primary market DeepSeek remains relatively conservative—or, put another way, investors are still discounting for “ban risk.”
What This Means for Ordinary Users
Three foreseeable changes:
- Open-source momentum will continue:DeepSeek It has consistently built influence through open-sourced weights; there is even less reason to scale back post-funding. Users relying on local deployment and fine-tuning can continue awaiting new releases
- API price wars will persistWith capital secured, the most direct competitive lever remains price cuts. Domestic model prices in China have already dropped to just a few tenths of a cent per million tokens this year—and this trend will continue
- Increased investment in training infrastructure: The first thing they typically do after raising funds is purchase compute power and build clusters. They have previously disclosed this publicly DSec elastic computing solution, and such infrastructure will remain open to the public
But there’s also a less optimistic angle: the more money they raise, the more likely they are to shift from a “technically driven small team” to a “publicly accountable company required to file financial reports.” If they truly pursue an IPO in China next year, their open-source model strategy and pricing strategy will be influenced by secondary-market sentiment—a point evident from already-listed companies like Zhipu and MiniMax.
Gap with the open-source vanguard
This year, on the open-source weight front,DeepSeek is no longer the sole leader. Mistral’s Large 4 “Le Chonk” has reached 1 trillion parameters and claims to be the strongest non-Chinese open-source weight; Reflection AI’s Beam directly challenges DeepSeek, GLM, and Qwen with its 501B-parameter model; Meta’s Muse Spark Open has also unveiled its 816B-parameter model.DeepSeek ’s advantage has never been parameter count, but rather cost efficiency and engineering efficiency at equivalent performance—this moat remains intact, yet competitors are closing in.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
DeepSeek How much funding was raised in this round?
According to Bloomberg, approximately $15 billion (about RMB 100 billion), with potential investors including CATL and Tencent.DeepSeek The company has not officially responded, and its valuation remains undisclosed.
Will the U.S. ban affect domestic users?
It will not affect domestic usage. The ban targets U.S. federal civilian agencies and their third-party service providers; the domestic web version, app, and API all operate normally. Open-source weight downloads are also unrestricted.
DeepSeek Will it go public?
The company is reportedly planning to launch its IPO in China as early as next year. A funding round in July was previously seen as preparation for the listing, but no official timeline has been announced yet.
Does Liang Wenfeng still control the company?
According to WireScreen’s calculation, he still holds approximately 81.6% of the shares in its Chinese operating entity. His control has not been significantly diluted after multiple funding rounds—a rarity among domestic AI companies.
Summarize
$15 billion is a signal:Blocked from overseas markets, DeepSeekit has secured ammunition to continue fighting domestically.The ban has not weakened it; instead, it has made domestic capital more willing to place bets. The real question is not how much was raised in this round, but whether it can maintain its current “low-cost + open-source” pace after its IPO next year.
To compare the actual capabilities and pricing of domestic versus overseas models, refer to our AI Model Library and Tool Comparison Engineor continue reading:U.S. federal ban on DeepSeek · Kimi K3 Launches on Bedrock · All Reviews.