In the First Half of the Year, Half of VC Money Flowed to AI, with These 30 Companies Alone Raising Over 170 Billion Yuan
First Half of 2026: VC Investment in AI Explodes, with 30 Top Companies Raising Over 170 Billion RMB
In the first half of 2026, China's AI sector saw a massive surge in venture capital, with total equity financing exceeding 300 billion RMB—already surpassing the entire 2025 total. Key trends include:
* **Massive Funding Scale:** The AI track recorded 1,203 financing events totaling over 300 billion RMB. Investment peaked in June, partly driven by DeepSeek's landmark 51-billion-RMB Series A round.
* **Geographic Concentration:** Beijing, Hangzhou, Shanghai, and Shenzhen dominated, accounting for 74% of deals and 86% of total funding. Beijing led with 95.5 billion RMB, while Hangzhou surged to second place due to DeepSeek's round.
* **Sector Focus:**
* **Large Models** were the top draw, securing over half of all funds (nearly 1.6 trillion RMB).
* **AI Infrastructure** (compute, chips) and **Embodied AI** (e.g., robotics) were other major investment areas, with the latter being the most active in number of deals.
* **AIGC Applications** attracted significant capital (59.6 billion RMB), indicating strong belief in near-term commercialization.
* **Investment Stage Logic:** Capital followed a clear strategy: heavy bets on growth-stage companies (A/B rounds), major funding for mature leaders, and widespread, smaller-scale seeding of early-stage innovators.
* **Notable Early-Stage Trends:** World models (seen as the "OS" for embodied AI) attracted the most early capital. Angel/seed rounds reached unprecedented sizes ("inflation"), and investment shifted from foundational large models to downstream applications like robotics and physical AGI.
* **Top Companies:** The 20 largest mid/late-stage deals raised 1.565 trillion RMB. Leaders include the "Big Three" large model firms (DeepSeek, StepFun, Kimi), seven leading humanoid robot companies ("Seven Samurai"), and top AIGC application players.
* **Outlook:** Full-year 2026 funding is projected to exceed 6 trillion RMB. However, consolidation is expected in the large model sector, with the window for pure-play general AI startups closing. Survival will depend on finding niche verticals or securing strategic backing.
marsbit07/03 09:01
