As was expected, soon OpenAI-made ChatGPT will get a tough competitor, and the result is in front of us. Yes, China’s new AI technology company DeepSeek has launched the Chat AI model DeepSeek-V3 with Deep Think R1 and the Web Search feature. This Chinese AI chat model has created a buzz all over the world.
DeepSeek’s Founder, Estabilish and Many More Details
DeepSeek is a Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) company. It was founded in 2023 in Hangzhou, China. The DeepSeek is an independent company without any parent company. Its founder and CEO is ‘Liang Wenfeng,’ who was previously a hedge fund manager and is co-founder of High Flyer Quant in 2015.
DeepSeek launched its first free chatbot app, DeepSeek V3, in January 2025 across the world. It is based on the DeepSeek-R1 model. and became the most downloaded free app on the US iOS App Store within a few days after launch.
It has a deep impact on the stock market, causing shares of major tech companies such as Nvidia to drop by 17-18%, which is a really major share impact. The company has recently gained significant attention in the global tech world.
DeepSeek-R1 AI Model
DeepSeek-R1 is an open-source AI model capable of learning logic, mathematical thinking, and solving problems in real time. The model performs comparably to Western counterparts such as OpenAI’s GPT-4, while its training cost has been around $6 million, which is much lower than GPT-4.
The AI model is capable of deploying the logical answer and handling the multiple cross-reasoning questions as well as mathematical concepts. In price comparison, it has a lower price comparison than other AI companies like OpenAI. However, some limitations were observed during the use of DeepSeek-R1.
Notably, the model is avoiding answering questions on sensitive political topics related to China, which hints at its censorship mechanism. It is clear the model keeps data secure to avoid exploitation, and developed by the algorithm, which follows China’s data privacy policy.
DeepSeek’s Investors, Cost and Members
If we talk about the funding of the company, it is already clear that it is an independent company, and DeepSeek has spent about $6 million (roughly ₹50 crore) on the final training phase of its model.
The financial success of High-Flyer played a significant key role in the development of DeepSeek. Since 2017, it has received a feature rate of 151% profit amount, which is providing DeepSeek with the necessary financial resources.
This figure only reflects the computing costs of the final training phase and does not include R&D. Experts suggest that total development costs could be much higher than expected, and unfortunately the exact figures are not publicly available.
Apart from this, there are no other company details of who invests in this project. However, its funding is rising via many global investors; it is also rising in share capital to expand more development.
We discovered varying figures regarding the number of employees. According to some reports, DeepSeek employs about 200 employees as of January 2025. However, according to other sources, the number of employees may be around 300.