DeepSeek raised over $7.4B at a $50B valuation in its first external funding round. The structure is unusual: investors placed funds into a limited partnership managed by CEO Liang Wenfeng, with no voting rights and a five-year lock-up.
Key facts
- Raised ~$7.4B at a $50B valuation.
- Liang Wenfeng invested ~$2.9B personally.
- Tencent and CATL are among the biggest outside backers.
- Investors face a five-year lock-up with no voting rights.
- DeepSeek-V4 is 11-35x cheaper than OpenAI's GPT-5.5.
Chinese AI startup DeepSeek has raised more than 50 billion yuan — approximately $7.4 billion — in its first external funding round, according to The Decoder. The company's valuation now tops $50 billion, The Information reports. As recently as April, the numbers being floated were at least $300 million at a $10 billion valuation.
The deal structure is unusual. Investors had to put their money into a limited partnership managed by CEO Liang Wenfeng, not directly into DeepSeek. They have no voting rights and face a five-year lock-up period. The only exception is China's state-backed AI investment fund, which invested directly and keeps its voting rights. Founder Liang himself put in about 20 billion yuan, according to Reuters. Tencent and battery maker CATL are among the biggest outside backers. Liang had told investors ahead of the round that he prioritizes foundational AI research and AGI development over short-term profits and plans to keep building open-source models.
DeepSeek gained global attention early last year with its V3 and R1 models. In April 2026, the company followed up with V4, the largest open-weights model to date, which runs on Huawei chips. DeepSeek is also squeezing US rivals on price. The company made its 75 percent discount on V4 Pro permanent, making the model roughly 11 times cheaper on input and 35 times cheaper on output than OpenAI's GPT-5.5. Still, DeepSeek's valuation is modest compared to OpenAI and Anthropic, which are both approaching the trillion-dollar mark.
What to watch
Watch for DeepSeek's next model release and whether it maintains its open-weights strategy as it scales. Also monitor Tencent and CATL's involvement in future rounds, and whether the limited partnership structure becomes a template for other Chinese AI labs.
Source: the-decoder.com
