DeepSeek doubles second funding round to 100 billion yuan
DeepSeek is nearing completion of its second funding round, doubling the total to 100 billion yuan at a steady valuation of about 500 billion yuan. New and existing investors are participating, and the company plans an IPO on the Science and Technology Innovation Board.
DeepSeek is nearing completion of its second funding round, with the total amount raised doubling to 100 billion yuan (HK$117.27 billion) in just half a month, while its pre-money valuation remains unchanged at approximately 500 billion yuan, mainland media reported.
The investment is split roughly equally between existing and new shareholders. New investors in this round include Stony Creek Capital, China Fortune-Tech Capital, CPE Asset Management, Legend Capital, and Geely. Existing shareholders include Contemporary Amperex Technology (3750), Tencent (0700), IDG Capital, Lux Capital, and Silicon 100. Notably, CATL is doubling its investment, having contributed approximately 5 billion yuan in DeepSeek's first funding round and planning to add another 10 billion yuan in this round.
If completed, the deal would bring DeepSeek's total capital raised to 150 billion yuan within just six months, marking the largest primary market financing in China this year.
The company's first funding round in April raised over 50 billion yuan at a valuation exceeding 350 billion yuan. Following that initial closing in late June, DeepSeek launched this second round in July at the current 500 billion yuan valuation.
Upon completion of this second round, DeepSeek is expected to finalize a corporate restructuring and, with the guidance of institutions such as CITIC Securities, prepare for an initial public offering on the Science and Technology Innovation Board.
Meanwhile, DeepSeek has agreed to lead a seed funding round worth tens of millions of dollars for Winverse AI, a robotics AI startup. Founded by Hu Han, the former chief scientist of the vision-language and embodied foundation model team at Tencent, Winverse AI has also secured investment commitments from other backers, including Meituan's (3690) investment arm, Long-Z Investments. The deal values the startup at approximately US$400 million (HK$3.12 billion), Bloomberg reported.
The report noted that this marks one of DeepSeek's largest investments in a startup since its founding in 2023. The move is aimed at expanding DeepSeek's capabilities into real-world applications, such as humanoid robots for industrial use. Previously, DeepSeek acquired a two per cent stake in Unitree Robotics to foster collaboration on embodied artificial intelligence models.