Two of China's most prominent artificial intelligence developers are moving closer to public market listings as they continue to attract significant investor interest. Beijing-based Moonshot AI, the creator of the Kimi chatbot, has finalized its latest private funding round, pushing its valuation to approximately $50 billion (€44.6bn). This represents a substantial increase from the $31.5 billion (€28.1bn) valuation the company achieved during a funding round earlier this summer.
According to people familiar with the matter, Moonshot AI is currently preparing for an initial public offering (IPO) in Hong Kong, with a target date in the first quarter of 2027. The potential listing could raise as much as $5 billion (€4.46bn), although the timeline remains subject to change. The firm's financial growth has been rapid; its annual recurring revenue has climbed from $300 million (€268mn) in June to roughly $1 billion (€892mn), with projections suggesting it could reach $2 billion (€1.78bn) by December.
Founded in early 2023 by Yang Zhilin, a Tsinghua University graduate with previous experience at Meta AI and Google Brain, the company has secured backing from major Chinese tech entities including Alibaba and Tencent. Global interest in the firm intensified in July following the release of its Kimi K3 open model.
Simultaneously, Hangzhou-based rival DeepSeek is nearing a significant capital raise of at least 80 billion yuan (€10.6bn). Major investors in this round include Tencent and battery manufacturer CATL. Strong demand could potentially drive the total to 100 billion yuan (€13.3bn), which would double the startup’s initial target of 50 billion yuan (€6.66bn). Previously, DeepSeek—which relied heavily on funding from founder Liang Wenfeng’s hedge fund High-Flyer until this year—had targeted a valuation of roughly 500 billion yuan (€66.5bn).
DeepSeek gained international attention in January 2025 when its low-cost R1 model impacted global markets, causing chipmaker Nvidia’s market value to drop by nearly $600 billion (€535bn) in one day. Since then, the company has released V4 models and a faster V4.1-Flash version in September. To further its development of programming tools for Huawei’s Ascend AI chips, DeepSeek has partnered with the Chinese tech giant, a move aligned with Beijing’s broader goal of reducing dependence on Nvidia.
Both companies are currently subject to an investigation by the Cyberspace Administration of China, the nation's internet regulator. The probe follows accusations from US-based firm Anthropic, which claims the Chinese developers utilized its Claude model to train their own systems, and concerns regarding the potential routing of sensitive user data to Anthropic. It remains unclear how this regulatory scrutiny might influence the companies' respective IPO plans. DeepSeek has reportedly engaged Chinese brokerage CITIC Securities to prepare for a potential listing on Shanghai's STAR Market, though details regarding the timing and scale of such an offering remain unconfirmed.
