DeepSeek's nearly $16 billion funding details revealed: Tencent and CATL as major investors, state-owned capital accounts for 27%

Beating AI News Flash: According to The Information citing two people directly familiar with the matter, DeepSeek's second funding round has raised RMB 105.5 billion (approximately $15.8 billion), attracting nearly 30 investors, with Tencent and CATL remaining the two major investors. State-owned investors contributed about 27% of this round's funding, up from 2% in the first round.

In terms of specific contributions, Tencent invested RMB 10 billion in both rounds; CATL and its chairman invested a combined RMB 5 billion and RMB 10 billion in the first round and this round, respectively. Other investors include ChangXin Memory Technologies and its chairman Zhu Yiming, SMIC, as well as companies such as vivo, Meituan, Geely, Midea, Luxshare Precision, Trip.com, and Xiaohongshu, with the latter investing RMB 1 billion to RMB 3 billion each.

Among state-owned investors, the National AI Development Fund invested another RMB 1 billion this round, the same amount as in the first round. Institutions including China Mobile, China Telecom, CICC, CITIC Securities, and China Life also participated, with each investing RMB 2 billion to RMB 8 billion. Looking at cumulative contributions across both rounds, tech companies contributed about 42%, while state-owned investors accounted for about 19%.

Among VC and private equity firms, Monolith Capital invested RMB 3 billion and RMB 7.5 billion in the two rounds respectively, IDG Capital invested a cumulative RMB 6.5 billion across both rounds, and Boyu Capital invested RMB 3.5 billion in the second round. The report said DeepSeek's first round used a special structure: apart from the National AI Development Fund, other investors were required to put funds into an entity held by Liang Wenfeng, give up voting rights, and commit to locking up shares for five years unless the company goes public early.

The funding expansion is mainly related to rising chip procurement costs and the need for capital reserves. During the four-month fundraising period, the price of servers equipped with 8 NVIDIA B300 chips rose from about RMB 15 million to RMB 19 million. People familiar with the matter said DeepSeek doubled its fundraising target midway through the round and also hoped to build reserves in advance to cope with the risk that the AI industry bubble may burst.