DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng enters Hurun China Rich List at seventh place with US$41.7bn fortune
Liang Wenfeng, founder of AI lab DeepSeek, debuted seventh on the 2026 Hurun China Rich List with US$41.7bn. ByteDance's Zhang Yiming reclaimed top spot with US$99.7bn, as AI wealth boosted China's rich list to a record 1,529 individuals.
Liang Wenfeng, founder of the Chinese frontier artificial intelligence lab DeepSeek, broke into the Hurun China Rich List for the first time, landing in seventh place with a fortune of US$41.7 billion (HK$325.26 billion), the 2026 report showed on Tuesday.
The global AI boom has pushed personal wealth higher in China, with ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming reclaiming the title of China's richest person for the second time, with a record-high fortune of US$99.7 billion, according to the Hurun China Rich List 2026.
Zhang was followed by Nongfu Spring founder Zhong Shanshan, with a fortune of US$61 billion, and CATL founder Robin Zeng Yuqun, with US$57.3 billion. Tencent's founder Pony Ma Huateng fell to fourth place with US$51.5 billion, and Midea's He Xiangjian and his family took fifth with US$46.1 billion.
Hong Kong's tycoon Li Ka-shing and his son Victor Li Tzar-kuoi, who hold a combined fortune of US$37.6 billion, maintained their ninth-place ranking.
Unitree founder Wang Xingxing is also among the newcomers, ranking 78th with a fortune of US$10.3 billion and marking the second-highest wealth among first-time entrants. Other AI large model founders also had a strong debut, led by Liu Debing and Tang Jie of Z.AI, with US$5.9 billion and US$4.1 billion in wealth, along with a US$3.4 billion fortune for MiniMax's Yan Junjie.
China saw 1,529 individuals with personal wealth above 5 billion yuan (HK$5.88 billion) in 2026, surpassing the previous record of 1,460 set in 2021, while the combined wealth increased 7 per cent year-on-year to US$4.8 trillion.