Timeline
DeepSeek is in early talks for a new funding round at a $71 billion pre-money valuation.
Released DSpark speculative decoding framework
Began developing custom inference ASICs to cut GPU dependency
China's domestic AI chip budget share rises to 46%, driven by DeepSeek and Zhipu exploring custom silicon
Raised $7B in first major funding round, abandoning no-funding pledge
Plans to launch Harness AI coding agent team to compete with Claude Code
Launched HarmonyOS 7 with Xiaoyi AI agent at HDC 2026
Huawei targets 1µm bond pitch for 2027 Kirin chips
Huawei targets 1.4nm-equivalent density by 2031 using Tau Scaling Law
Kirin chips with LogicFolding architecture ship this fall
Ecosystem
DeepSeek
Huawei
Evidence (6 articles)
rAIcast Episode 2 Analyzes DeepSeek V4, Claude Mythos, and AI Law
Apr 13, 2026DeepSeek Hits $45B Valuation in First VC Round, Led by China State Fund
May 6, 2026AI Weekly: GPT-6 Rumors, DeepSeek V4 on Huawei, Anthropic Models, Qwen 3.6-Plus
Apr 5, 2026DeepSeek Teases 'Much Larger' Base Model Release Amid Industry Silence and Hardware Challenges
Mar 25, 2026DeepSeek V4 Launch Signals China's Strategic Shift in AI Chip Independence
Feb 28, 2026DeepSeek V4 to Run on Huawei Ascend 950PR Chips, Sparking 20% Price Surge
Apr 3, 2026