Rhodium: Chinese AI Firms Earn About 10% of OpenAI's Revenue

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Summary · why it matters

China's major artificial intelligence companies together generate only about 10% of the revenue that OpenAI alone reports, according to a new analysis from Rhodium Group that raises questions about how investors are valuing the country's AI startups. Rhodium Group published estimates on Thursday using annual recurring revenue, an industry metric calculated by multiplying a recent monthly revenue figure by 12. OpenAI's ARR stands at $40 billion, while Anthropic's reaches $65 billion, the firm said, and among Chinese companies ByteDance led with $4 billion, followed by Alibaba at $2.4 billion, Z.AI at $1.8 billion, Moonshot at $1 billion, MiniMax at $800 million, and DeepSeek at $500 million. The gap is starker when set against the valuations investors have placed on Chinese AI startups, with Rhodium estimating that Moonshot carries a valuation-to-revenue ratio of 50x and DeepSeek one of 163x, both well above OpenAI's 34x and Anthropic's 21x. Logan Wright, a partner at Rhodium Group who co-authored the report with research analyst Endeavour Tian, said the financing gap means it will be far more difficult for Chinese frontier AI labs to scale sustainably and that they will be heavily dependent upon a favorable climate in the equity market. Several of the companies covered in the report are moving toward public markets, with Moonshot filing confidentially for a Hong Kong IPO and aiming to raise $3 billion, and DeepSeek engaging CITIC Securities to prepare for a listing on Shanghai's STAR Market, while Z.AI told investors Wednesday that it has raised its year-end ARR target to $3 billion, compared with the $2.4 billion it had previously projected.

Impact on stocks 5

Artificial Intelligence▼ · 3 stocks
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd
9988
▼ NegativeDemandrelevance

Rhodium estimates Alibaba's AI ARR at only $2.4B, far below OpenAI's $40B, raising doubts about Chinese AI revenue scale.

MiniMax Group Inc
0100
▼ NegativeCapitalrelevance

MiniMax's $800M ARR is dwarfed by US peers, and Rhodium warns Chinese labs face a difficult financing gap to scale.

Biotech & Genomic Medicine▲ · 1 stocks
Others▲ · 1 stocks
CITIC Securities Co Ltd
600030
± MixedCapitalrelevance

CITIC Securities is engaged to prepare DeepSeek's STAR Market listing, a passing mention of its advisory role.

Theme Impact 2

Off-coverage companies 5

DeepSeekPrivate▼ Negative
Capitalrelevance

DeepSeek's $500M ARR against a 163x valuation-to-revenue ratio raises questions about its lofty valuation ahead of a STAR Market listing.

ByteDancePrivate± Mixed
relevance

ByteDance leads Chinese AI firms with $4B ARR, but the report frames this as far below OpenAI/Anthropic, raising valuation concerns.

AnthropicPrivate▲ Positive
Demandrelevance

Anthropic's ARR reaches $65B, cited as far exceeding Chinese AI firms' combined revenue, underscoring its strong end-customer demand.

OpenAIPrivate▲ Positive
Demandrelevance

OpenAI's $40B ARR is cited as the benchmark showing Chinese AI firms generate only about 10% of its revenue.

Rhodium GroupPrivate± Mixed
relevance

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