DeepSeek is also seeking funding, moving from self-developed to open capital. This move is quite bold; a valuation of hundreds of billions is no small feat. Let's see how they proceed from here.

DeepSeek is planning its first external funding round, targeting a valuation of over $10 billion—signaling a shift from self-developed, in-house momentum to bringing in external capital. If realized, its valuation would jump multiple times from about $3.4 billion. It has risen on the strength of low-cost, high-performance open-source large models, with training costs significantly below the industry average and performance benchmarked against leading U.S. models—driving global expansion and reshaping China’s competitive landscape in the AI field.