Chinese AI startup DeepSeek is planning to launch a fresh fundraising round at a valuation of about 500 billion yuan (US$74 billion) ahead of a potential mainland initial public offering, two people with knowledge of the matter said.The plan comes just weeks after the Hangzhou-based company, which drew global attention with its low-cost AI models in 2025, raised about $7.4 billion in June at a post-money valuation of about 450 billion yuan, the people said. Filings by two Chinese investors later suggested DeepSeek was valued at 350.88 billion yuan, or around $52 billion.
The back-to-back fundraising plans underscore strong investor appetite for one of China's most closely watched AI companies, but also point to the rising costs of competing in AI, which requires large amounts of computing power, data-center capacity and engineering talent.
DeepSeek is looking to raise as much as 50 billion yuan in the new funding round, according to a third person briefed on the matter.
It has also started early deliberations on a potential IPO on Shanghai's Nasdaq-style STAR Market, the three sources and two other people with knowledge of the plan said.
The company has set an internal target to complete an IPO filing this year, one of them said.
