Chinese language AI firm DeepSeek made international headlines for serving to spark a large sell-off in U.S. tech shares on Monday, with Nvidia dropping nearly 20%.
In China, the hype round DeepSeek has despatched shares of some public firms with supposed ties to it hovering. The issue: There’s no proof these firms ever invested in or cooperated with DeepSeek to start with.
Rumored DeepSeek traders Huajin Capital and Zhejiang Orient popped by 10% on Monday, whereas a analysis firm known as Elegant China Info jumped 20% for supposedly cooperating with DeepSeek on its AI fashions. (These are the authorized most each day positive aspects in Chinese language exchanges.)
Nevertheless, Elegant China Info denied cooperating with DeepSeek in a disclosure, and Huajin Capital denied to a Chinese language enterprise information outlet that it ever disclosed a DeepSeek funding. Funding firm Zhejiang Orient hasn’t responded to a request for remark from DailyTech, however there’s no public proof that they’re an investor in DeepSeek, both.
The rumors seem to have originated from unsubstantiated Chinese language lists — which have gone viral — of varied publicly-traded firms supposedly tied to DeepSeek.
DeepSeek, a non-public firm, has by no means publicly introduced any VC investments, whereas Chinese language company data make no point out of VC companies on DeepSeek’s cap desk. As an alternative, its founder Liang Wenfeng is listed because the useful proprietor of all three entities that type DeepSeek. DeepSeek is funded by the quant agency Excessive-Flyer (which Wenfeng is CEO of) and has no plans to fundraise, Wenfeng instructed Chinese language media outlet Waves final yr.
In a 2023 interview with the identical outlet, Wenfeng stated he had discussions with completely different funding sources, however VCs “appeared hesitant” about investing in a research-focused firm, prioritizing commercialization as an alternative.
DeepSeek didn’t reply to DailyTech’s remark request.
