The DeepSeek hired CITIC Securities to prepare an initial public offering (IPO) on Shanghai's STAR Market, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter who spoke to Reuters this Wednesday (9). The Chinese startup plans to begin the process as early as 2026, although the offering value, the company's valuation and the timeline for a potential stock exchange debut have not yet been defined.
The choice of CITIC marks another step forward in the company's plans to go public. In mainland China, companies planning an IPO usually hire a brokerage firm to conduct a preparation phase before formally filing a listing application. DeepSeek and CITIC did not comment on the information.
The move comes as the company seeks more funds to finance computing infrastructure, AI model development, and hiring and retention of researchers. DeepSeek is in a new funding round that could value it at 500 billion yuan, about US$ 75 billion.
In June, the startup raised approximately US$ 7.4 billion and reached a valuation of more than US$ 50 billion after the investment. Founder Liang Wenfeng committed 20 billion yuan in the round, while Tencent and CATL invested 10 billion and 5 billion yuan, respectively, becoming the largest external shareholders.
The race for capital comes at a time of sharply rising costs for developing artificial intelligence models, with growing spending on chips, data centers and specialized professionals. According to one of the sources, Liang intends to use proceeds from a future offering also to strengthen the team incentives, after losing professionals to companies such as ByteDance and Xiaomi.
DeepSeek is not alone in pursuing the capital markets. Chinese companies Z.AI and MiniMax went public in Hong Kong this year, while Moonshot submitted a confidential application for its own IPO in the city.
