Kimi maker Moonshot AI raises $2B at $20B from Alibaba and Tencent

Meituan's venture arm led the round and put in over $200 million, with China Mobile and CITIC Private Equity also taking part. Huafeng Capital's statements name Shuimu Capital, China Mobile and CPE Yuanfeng as other participants. Alibaba and Tencent appear in coverage as longtime backers, so the headline's investor list reflects the cap table more than this round's confirmed cheque writers. Annual recurring revenue passed $200 million in April, driven by paid subscriptions and API usage. That was up from about $100 million in March. The step-up was fast. The company was reportedly valued at $4.3 billion late last year, then $10 billion earlier this year after a separate $700 million raise. A larger round followed. Tracxn lists a $3.5 billion Series F on July 29 led by the National Artificial Intelligence Industry Investment Fund. Valuation figures for that round conflict across data providers. Rival DeepSeek is pursuing a $45 billion valuation, while Zhipu AI and MiniMax are public in Hong Kong. Moonshot is also reported to be preparing a Hong Kong IPO. For founders, the signal is that open-weight models can still draw very large rounds. Strategic and state-linked money now sits alongside venture funds, and revenue is growing quickly enough to support these prices. Teams building on Kimi or competing with it should expect a well-funded rival that is spending heavily on training and compute.