Money

Revenue & ARR

Revenue across China's labs is uneven, and the numbers aren't directly comparable — audited company revenue, management-disclosed ARR, and parent-platform AI revenue all mean different things. Ranked by our tracked signal; tap a source to verify.

Labs tracked
12
revenue / ARR signals
Audited revenue
2
MiniMax (稀宇科技), Zhipu AI / Z.ai (智谱AI)
Highest run-rate
~$4.9B
Qwen team @ Alibaba (通义千问 / 通义实验室) (platform AI)
Valuation vs. Run-Rate

ARR Multiple Snapshot

This is a valuation-to-run-rate comparison, not a clean ranking. The Western labs use private-market valuations; MiniMax and Zhipu use public market caps. Zhipu is shown with an estimated company ARR range because it only discloses MaaS API ARR.

CompanyValuation / market capARR usedValuation / ARR
Anthropic
~$965B
~$47B run-rate revenue~20.5x
OpenAI
~$852B
~$25B reported; ~$33B gross-equivalent sensitivity~26x-34x
StepFun
$10B
$10B reported IPO target valuation
~$165M 2026E revenue~60.6x
Moonshot / Kimi
~$20B
>$200M ARR~100x
MiniMax
$18.7B
Market cap · live, 2026-06-09
$150M+ ARR~124x
Zhipu / Z.ai
$64.9B
Market cap · live, 2026-06-09
$300M-$500M estimated ARR~130x-216x

OpenAI / Anthropic footnote: reported run-rates are not normalized. OpenAI's March 2026 valuation is from OpenAI; its revenue growth basis is from Semafor. Anthropic's May 2026 valuation and run-rate are from Axios; its growth basis is from Axios. Semafor separately reported that OpenAI counts cloud-partner token sales closer to net revenue, while Anthropic counts closer to gross revenue, and that OpenAI's run-rate could be up to $8B higher if counted on a gross basis.

Zhipu footnote: disclosed MaaS API ARR was roughly $250M as of March 2026. FY2025 API/open-platform revenue was 26.3% of total revenue, but that historical recognized-revenue mix should not be mechanically applied to ARR because much of the non-API business is on-premises enterprise deployment and may not be recurring. The $300M-$500M range is an Atlas estimate, not company-disclosed total ARR.

Commercialization Evidence

Commercialization revenue ramp

Toggle ARR/run-rate versus recognized revenue, and switch between calendar time and months since each lab's first public model/product baseline. When both U.S. and China are selected, the chart switches to log scale because the dollar gap is too large for a linear chart to stay readable.

Scale: log scale. Both regions are selected, so the chart compresses the vertical axis. Use it for shape and timing, not for visual size comparisons. X-axis: months since first public model/product baseline.
$3M$10M$30M$100M$300M$1B$3B$10B$30B$50BM0M12M24M36M48$2B$25B net$33B est.$1B$47B gross$100M$200M$150M+$400M est.
OpenAI reported net
OpenAI gross estimate
Anthropic reported gross
Moonshot / Kimi ARR
MiniMax ARR
Zhipu company ARR estimate
ARR/run-rate is a point-in-time annualized metric. OpenAI and Anthropic are not on the same accounting basis, so the dotted OpenAI line is an estimate.
1
Qwen team @ Alibaba (通义千问 / 通义实验室)
Open-Model Bazaar

Alibaba disclosed RMB8.971B (~$1.3B) of AI-related product revenue inside Cloud Intelligence. This is stronger than generic cloud revenue, but it is still Alibaba platform revenue around Qwen, Bailian, training, inference, and cloud AI products, not a clean Qwen product/API line.

via Alibaba results / SCMP
Revenue
RMB9.0B (~$1.3B)
Jan-Mar 2026 Alibaba AI-related product revenue
ARR / run-rate
~RMB35.9B (~$5.2B) platform run-rate
annualized run-rate
2
MiniMax (稀宇科技)
Multimodal Showrunners

MiniMax reported 573.5M CNY (~$79M) FY2025 revenue, up 158.9% YoY, with ARR above $150M.

via MiniMax results / KR Asia
Revenue
$79.0M
As of 2026-03-03
ARR / run-rate
$150M+
ARR
3
Zhipu AI / Z.ai (智谱AI)
Academic-to-Enterprise Pipeline

Zhipu reported RMB724M (~$105M) FY2025 revenue, with cloud/API revenue growing quickly. Its disclosed MaaS API ARR was around $250M as of March 2026; our broader company ARR estimate is $300M-$500M.

via Knowledge Atlas annual report
Revenue
RMB724M (~$105M)
As of 2026-03-31
ARR / run-rate
$300M-$500M estimated ARR
ARR
4
Moonshot AI / Kimi (月之暗面)
Long Window

Moonshot reportedly passed $200M ARR while Kimi reached 50M+ monthly active users.

via TechCrunch
Revenue
>$200M
ARR, Apr 2026
ARR / run-rate
N/A
ARR
5
StepFun (阶跃星辰)
Multimodal-to-Device Crew

StepFun reportedly generated about 500M CNY (~$69M) in 2025 revenue, with a 2026 forecast near 1.2B CNY (~$165M).

via CMBI citing Caijing
Revenue
~RMB500M (~$69M)
As of 2026-04-15
ARR / run-rate
~RMB1.2B 2026E (~$165M)
annualized run-rate
6
ByteDance Doubao + Seed (豆包 / Seed)
Consumer Feedback Flywheel

ByteDance does not disclose Seed/Doubao revenue. 36Kr reports Volcano Engine leading public-cloud model calls and highlights Doubao's phone/agent push as an ecosystem-control test.

via 36Kr
Revenue
Not disclosed
AI-specific revenue unavailable
ARR / run-rate
N/A
7
Xiaomi MiMo (小米 MiMo)
Pocket-to-Dashboard Stack

Xiaomi reported $14.63B in FY2025 Smart EV + AI segment revenue, but MiMo revenue is not separately disclosed.

via Sina Finance
Revenue
Not disclosed
MiMo revenue not broken out
ARR / run-rate
No pure-AI run-rate
8
Hunyuan team @ Tencent (混元)
Mass-Market Distribution Engine

Tencent does not disclose Hunyuan revenue separately. Signal comes from cloud, Yuanbao, and platform reach.

via Tencent annual report
Revenue
Not separate
FY2025 embedded disclosure
ARR / run-rate
$31.6B enterprise services
annualized run-rate
9
Meituan LongCat (美团龙猫)
Local-Services Dispatch

LongCat fits Meituan workflows, but no separate revenue disclosure exists yet.

Revenue
Not disclosed
No lab revenue line
ARR / run-rate
N/A
10
Baichuan AI (百川智能)
Healthcare Hard Pivot

Baichuan has a concrete healthcare vertical, but scale remains unclear.

Revenue
Not disclosed
Healthcare pivot
ARR / run-rate
N/A
11
DeepSeek (深度求索)
Cost-Curve Rebels

DeepSeek has API pricing and huge model impact, but no disclosed revenue scale.

via 36Kr
Revenue
Not disclosed
API pricing only
ARR / run-rate
Scale unknown
12
01.AI (零一万物)
Frontier Exit

01.AI is context now; its frontier team was absorbed into Alibaba.

Revenue
Not active race
Frontier exit Q1 2025
ARR / run-rate
N/A