Chinese AI unicorn Moonshot AI has launched a new funding round, targeting a post-money valuation of $30 billion and raising up to $2 billion. The valuation represents a nearly sevenfold jump from its December 2025 valuation of just over $4 billion, underscoring the intense capital race in China's large language model sector. If completed, this would be the company's third round within six months.
Meituan Leads Again: Three Rounds in Six Months
Sources say Moonshot AI has begun early talks with potential investors, with an initial target of over $1 billion. The current round is being discussed even as the previous round—led by Meituan at a $20 billion valuation—is still closing. At $30 billion, Moonshot AI would surpass listed peer MiniMax (market cap around $20 billion) but still trail Zhipu ($80 billion) and DeepSeek (about $50 billion at first close). The valuation trajectory is among the fastest in China's AI history: a $500 million Series C in December 2025 at $4.3 billion, a Meituan-led round in May 2026 at $20 billion, and now $30 billion—a sevenfold increase in half a year.
ARR Tops $200 Million Monthly, Monetization Accelerates
Meituan Longzhu partner Wang Xinyu revealed that after the Kimi K2.5 model update, Moonshot AI's annualized recurring revenue (ARR) surpassed $100 million in early March and grew to over $200 million in April. Global Kimi paid users grew 170% month-over-month, and overseas API revenue quadrupled thanks to the K2 Thinking model. The company recently launched Kimi Work and Kimi Code, targeting AI coding and agent productivity in direct competition with Anthropic's Claude Code. Founder Yang Zhilin, a former Tsinghua professor and Meta/Google researcher, emphasizes making AI "learn faster and remember longer"—the team's MUON second-order optimizer claims to double AI learning efficiency.
VIE Unwinding Preps Hong Kong IPO, AI 'Six Tigers' Race to Public Markets
On the capital structure side, Moonshot AI is dismantling its VIE (variable interest entity) structure to pave the way for a Hong Kong listing. A joint venture framework is being set up to allow foreign investment despite Beijing's tighter outbound IPO rules. Earlier this year, Yang said in an internal letter that the company was "in no rush to go public," but the pace of three rounds in six months signals an IPO countdown. Among China's "Six Tigers" of large models, Jieyue Xingchen could file its IPO prospectus this month, while Zero One and Baichuan plan listings next year. With DeepSeek's open-source model sweeping globally and Zhipu commanding an $80 billion valuation, whether Moonshot AI can close this round at $30 billion will be a key test of China's AI capital market appetite.