--- title: "DeepSeek founder declares AGI as the goal as $10bn funding round advances" url: https://daily.dev/posts/deepseek-founder-declares-agi-as-the-goal-as-10bn-funding-round-advances-fblx3bgwg source_url: https://thenextweb.com/news/deepseek-agi-goal-10bn-funding-round type: article source: "The Next Web" published: 2026-05-22T08:10:09.723Z updated: 2026-05-22T08:10:33.573Z tags: ["ai", "open-source", "llm", "deepseek"] reading_time: 3 upvotes: 7 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # DeepSeek founder declares AGI as the goal as $10bn funding round advances **[The Next Web](https://daily.dev/sources/tnw)** · 3 min read · 7 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary DeepSeek founder Liang Wenfeng has told prospective investors that the Hangzhou AI lab is targeting AGI as its primary goal, in the company's first-ever external funding round. The raise targets a $10bn valuation, with at least $300m sought in this round and potentially $7bn or more long-term. Previously self-funded through High-Flyer Quant, DeepSeek is opening to outside capital as training costs exceed what even a profitable hedge fund can cover. Liang has committed to keeping models open-source under permissive licensing and prioritizing frontier research over short-term commercialization. The lab's recent V4-Pro and V4-Flash models, a 1.6-trillion-parameter MoE system, were released open-source and optimized for both Nvidia and Chinese domestic chips like Huawei Ascend. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [DeepSeek closes $7bn-plus round with an unusual structure](https://daily.dev/posts/deepseek-closes-7bn-plus-round-with-an-unusual-structure-m7c3t4nek) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [DeepSeek could hit $45B valuation from its first investment round](https://daily.dev/posts/deepseek-could-hit-45b-valuation-from-its-first-investment-round-7otcarw9c) · TechCrunch · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [DeepSeek's $45bn valuation is also Beijing's strategic statement](https://daily.dev/posts/deepseek-s-45bn-valuation-is-also-beijing-s-strategic-statement-cng5qr4ft) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai](https://daily.dev/tags/ai), [#open-source](https://daily.dev/tags/open-source), [#llm](https://daily.dev/tags/llm), [#deepseek](https://daily.dev/tags/deepseek) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/deepseek-founder-declares-agi-as-the-goal-as-10bn-funding-round-advances-fblx3bgwg)