In less than six months since its debut on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, Zhipu AI has transformed from a promising Tsinghua University spinoff into a trillion-dollar titan. On June 22, the company’s share price surged by over 40% in intraday trading, eventually settling at a valuation of HK$1.07 trillion. This milestone represents a staggering 20-fold increase from its initial public offering price, placing the young AI firm in the same valuation league as established giants like Ping An Insurance and making it twice as valuable as the delivery behemoth Meituan.
This explosive growth signals a profound shift in how the market values generative AI. Investors are moving away from the 'Chinese OpenAI' narrative, which focused on user scale and general benchmarks, toward a more pragmatic 'Anthropic-style' valuation logic centered on coding capability. By prioritizing GLM-5.2’s programming prowess, Zhipu AI has positioned itself as an essential tool for enterprise digital transformation, where code generation offers a visible and rapid path to monetization.
The company’s recent decision to open-source its GLM-5.2 model has further fueled investor fervor. In a calculated move toward 'technological sovereignty,' Zhipu declared that frontier intelligence should not be the exclusive domain of a few global players or subject to sudden geopolitical restrictions. This stance has resonated deeply within China’s tech ecosystem, framing Zhipu not just as a commercial entity, but as a strategic pillar of national self-reliance in the AI arms race.
However, Zhipu’s ascent is shadowed by the harsh realities of its balance sheet. Despite its trillion-dollar valuation, the company’s annual revenue remains below 1 billion RMB, and it recorded a net loss of 4.7 billion RMB in 2025. The discrepancy between its 'valuation of dreams' and its commercial fundamentals has led some analysts to warn of a potential bubble. Technical stability also remains an issue; as recently as February, the company was forced to issue a public apology after its servers buckled under the weight of high demand.
To bridge the gap between its immense capital requirements and its current revenue streams, Zhipu is now eyeing a dual-listing on Shanghai’s STAR Market. Having recently completed IPO guidance, the company aims to raise an additional 15 billion RMB to fund its intensive R&D and compute costs. Whether Zhipu can translate its paper wealth into a sustainable, profitable ecosystem will determine if it remains the crown jewel of Chinese AI or serves as a cautionary tale of speculative excess.