DeepSeek takes outside money for the first time at a $50 billion valuation

DeepSeek 完成首轮外部融资，估值超 500 亿美元

DeepSeek raised over 50 billion yuan (~$7.4B) in its first external round, hitting a valuation above $50B. The deal structure is unusual: investors put money into a limited partnership managed by CEO Liang Wenfeng, get no voting rights, and face a five-year lock-up. China's state-backed AI fund is the only direct investor with voting rights. Liang himself put in about 20 billion yuan. Tencent and CATL are the largest outside backers. Liang told investors he prioritizes foundational AI research and AGI over short-term profits, and plans to keep building open-source models. DeepSeek's V4 Pro is roughly 11x cheaper on input and 35x cheaper on output than OpenAI's GPT-5.5. The $50B valuation is still modest next to OpenAI and Anthropic, both approaching the trillion-dollar mark.

Why it matters: DeepSeek's first external round at a $50B+ valuation with ~$7.4B raised, structured through a limited partnership managed by Liang Wenfeng — investors get no voting rights and face a five-year lockup, while the only direct voting investor is a state-owned AI fund. All three HK...