Zhipu AI, a Beijing-based artificial intelligence (AI) unicorn born out of China’s prestigious Tsinghua University, has filed pre-initial public offering (IPO) documents with China’s securities regulator as it eyes a public listing as soon as 2026 amid an increasingly competitive domestic landscape.
The 6-year-old company submitted the tutoring documents to the Beijing Securities Regulatory Bureau on Monday, a key compliance step before formally applying to the China Securities Regulatory Commission. The start-up plans to finalise its IPO application preparation by October, with China International Capital Corporation (CICC) serving as the tutoring institution. This would set it up for a possible IPO next year, but the company did not specify which exchange it is targeting.
Zhipu – whose controlling shareholders are founder Tang Jie, a renowned Tsinghua computer scientist, and chairman Liu Debing – has attracted more than 10 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion) in funding. Investors include state-backed entities such as Beijing’s Zhongguancun Science City, Beijing AI Industry Investment Fund and local government funds from the cities of Chengdu, Hangzhou and Zhuhai. Venture capital firms HongShan Capital Group, GL Ventures, Qiming Venture Partners, Lightspeed China Partners and Capital Today are also backers, as are a number of Chinese tech giants, including Xiaomi, Meituan, Tencent Holdings and Alibaba Group Holding, owner of the South China Morning Post, according to corporate database Tianyancha and company announcements.
Zhipu has quickly risen to become a darling of China’s AI industry and is considered one of its “four tigers”, alongside start-ups Baichuan, Moonshot AI and MiniMax. It has recently made some strategic investments as it looks to expand.
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Last year, Zhipu launched a 1.5 billion yuan venture fund called “Z”, targeting early-stage AI start-ups. The fund has backed dozens of companies, including AI infrastructure firm Infinigence AI, Siliconflow, Modelbest and multimodal AI developer Vidu.
