Bloomberg: Moonshot AI closes $3.5bn round at $35bn valuation

Moonshot AI, the developer of the world's largest open-weight AI model, has successfully closed a $3.5bn funding round at a $35bn valuation, as reported by Bloomberg. This round far exceeded the initial expectation of $1bn to $2bn, underscoring the strong interest in affordable Chinese AI models that can compete with US counterparts. Notably, China’s National Artificial Intelligence Industry Investment Fund was among the lead investors in this round, which also included DeepSeek’s recent $7.4bn funding round.

Following the unveiling of their latest model, Kimi K3, Moonshot AI witnessed a surge in popularity, causing a rush of new subscriptions that overwhelmed their GPUs. Consequently, the company temporarily halted new user sign-ups. Bloomberg had previously reported that the initial enthusiasm resulted in daily sales at Moonshot increasing sixfold since the launch of K3. New subscriptions remain on hold for now, but interested parties can join a waitlist.

Moonshot AI is now targeting a $50bn pre-money valuation for a potential new funding round, according to sources cited by Bloomberg. The company is working towards a public listing within six months. Moonshot's valuation was last at $20bn after a $2bn raise announced in May. The launch of their K3 model has been compared to DeepSeek's release earlier this year, which raised questions about security concerns in the West.

Other Chinese tech companies, such as Alibaba, Zhipu, and MiniMax, have also recently released successful AI models. As the US and China vie for supremacy in the AI domain, both nations are intensifying their investments in AI infrastructure and supporting AI start-ups to expand their market presence through stock market listings.