DeepSeek is preparing for an IPO — its valuation target: $66 billion

DeepSeek, the Chinese AI company behind the open-weight model that upended the industry in late 2024, has started preparing for an initial public offering. The company could file its listing application as soon as this year.

The company is targeting a mainland China listing, with plans to go public by 2027 at the earliest, according to sources familiar with the matter. DeepSeek has already begun working with accounting firms and investment banks, aiming to complete its financial reports — a prerequisite for any IPO filing — by the end of December.

Before the IPO, DeepSeek is planning another round of private fundraising. The company is targeting a pre-investment valuation of at least 480 billion RMB, or roughly $66 billion. That would put it in the same valuation tier as some of the world’s most valuable AI startups.

The company hopes to raise at least 10 billion RMB in this round, though the final figure could multiply depending on investor appetite. If the fundraising goes as planned, DeepSeek would file its IPO application sometime between late 2026 and early 2027, with the exact timing hinging on when the financial audits are done.

None of this is set in stone. DeepSeek is still actively discussing the details with advisors, and both the IPO timeline and fundraising targets could shift depending on market conditions. The talks are private, and the people who shared the information asked not to be named.

The valuation target reflects just how far DeepSeek has come in under two years. The company’s release of its V4 model earlier this month, which matched or beat frontier models from OpenAI and Anthropic on several benchmarks while charging far less for API access, reinforced its position as a contender in the AI race — not just in China, but globally.