China’s Zhipu AI raises $137 million as state funds bet on AI race

Chinese artificial intelligence startup Zhipu AI has raised more than 1 billion yuan ($137.22 million) in fresh funding, months after securing a 3 billion yuan investment.

The funding round comes amid intensifying competition in China’s AI sector, particularly after rival DeepSeek‘s emergence with its large language models that claim to match Western competitors’ capabilities at lower costs.

State-backed Hangzhou City Investment Group Industrial Fund and Shangcheng Capital are among the investors in the round, Zhipu AI said in a WeChat statement on…