Chinese AI startup Zhipu AI has secured more than 1 billion yuan ($137.22 million) in fresh funding, months after raising 3 billion yuan in December.
The funding round, backed by state-owned Hangzhou City Investment Group Industrial Fund and Shangcheng Capital, comes as competition in China’s AI sector escalates.
Zhipu AI said it will use the funds to enhance its GLM large language model and expand its AI ecosystem, focusing on businesses in Zhejiang province and the Yangtze River Delta. The investment highlights Hangzhou’s growing efforts to position itself as a major AI hub, with state-owned enterprises actively supporting AI ventures.
Founded in 2019 and considered one of China’s “AI tigers,” Zhipu AI has completed 16 funding rounds. The latest investment follows a broader shift in the AI market, where rivals such as DeepSeek are gaining traction with open-source large language models that claim to rival Western platforms at lower costs.
In a WeChat statement Monday, Zhipu AI announced plans to release new open-source AI models, including foundation models, inference models, multimodal models, and AI agents. The move signals its strategy to compete in an evolving AI landscape shaped by open-source innovations.
