DeepSeek Finally Takes Outside Money — $300M at $10B+

DeepSeek is in talks to raise at least $300 million at a valuation of $10 billion or more — its first-ever external funding round, per The Information. The startup has been entirely self-funded through High-Flyer Capital Management since inception, famously turning away China's top VCs and tech giants to protect its research culture.

The shift is driven by brutal infrastructure pressure. Demand for DeepSeek's models and API has exploded, straining compute capacity. The company needs more GPUs, servers, and training budget to stay competitive — especially as it pushes into costlier reasoning systems and AI agents. Its R1 model was trained for a jaw-dropping ~$6M, but that era of extreme efficiency may be hitting its ceiling.

Expect the round to draw domestic Chinese investors primarily — US firms face regulatory headwinds. Founder Liang Wenfeng built DeepSeek's reputation on doing more with less; now the question is whether outside capital changes that DNA.

Why it matters: DeepSeek opening to investors signals even the most capital-efficient AI lab can't outrun the compute arms race indefinitely.