# DeepSeek Set to Lead Seed Round for Ex-Tencent Scientist's Robotics Startup at About $400 Million Valuation

Times of AI Desk · 2026-10-13 · Industry

[https://timesof.ai/2026/10/deepseek-leads-winverse-ai-seed-400m-valuation](https://timesof.ai/2026/10/deepseek-leads-winverse-ai-seed-400m-valuation)

> DeepSeek is set to lead a seed round of tens of millions of dollars for Winverse AI, a months-old robotics-AI startup founded by former Tencent scientist Hu Han, Bloomberg reported on Oct. 12, citing people familiar. Meituan's Long-Z has also committed; the deal would value Winverse at roughly $400 million. Terms are not final, and no company has confirmed.

DeepSeek is preparing to put some of its war chest into robots, according to a Bloomberg report. The Hangzhou lab is set to lead the first funding round for **Winverse AI**, a robotics-AI startup only a few months old, **Bloomberg** reported on Monday, October 12, citing people familiar with the matter, according to **Investing.com** and **Quartz**, which both relay the Bloomberg story.

## The terms, as reported

- **Size:** a seed round worth **tens of millions of dollars**, not $400 million.
- **Valuation:** other investors, including **Meituan's Long-Z Investments**, have committed on terms that would value Winverse at roughly **$400 million** after the investment.
- **Status:** the deal has not been finalised, and the valuation and investor list could change.
- **Funding source:** DeepSeek would draw on its own fundraising, which Bloomberg earlier reported is close to at least 80 billion yuan (about $12 billion), as we covered in [DeepSeek Nears an 80B-Yuan Round](https://timesof.ai/2026/10/deepseek-80b-yuan-moonshot-50b-pre-ipo-rounds).

## Who is behind Winverse

Winverse was founded in 2026 by **Hu Han**, who most recently led Tencent's vision-language and embodied foundation model teams as lead scientist. He holds a Tsinghua PhD and has worked at Microsoft Research Asia and Baidu. Investing.com says his exit coincided with a restructuring of Tencent's AI research team. Hu, DeepSeek and Long-Z did not respond to requests for comment, Quartz says, citing Bloomberg.

## Why DeepSeek would do this

Bloomberg frames it as one of DeepSeek's biggest startup bets and a push into real-world uses such as humanoid robots. China leads in robot hardware, but the models that let robots handle speech and real tasks are a separate, less developed field, the report says, pointing to US rivals **Skild AI** and **Physical Intelligence**, valued at $14 billion and $5.6 billion. DeepSeek already took a small stake in Unitree Robotics at its Shanghai listing; Investing.com puts it at 2% and Quartz at 2.31%.

## Limits

- Everything here traces to one anonymously sourced Bloomberg report; Investing.com and Quartz are relays, not independent confirmation.
- Bloomberg's original is paywalled and was not read directly.

## Sources

- [Investing.com: DeepSeek to lead funding round for robotics AI startup Winverse at $400 mln - report (October 12, 2026; relaying Bloomberg)](https://www.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/deepseek-to-lead-funding-round-for-robotics-ai-startup-winverse-at-400-mln--report-93CH-4944293)
- [Quartz: DeepSeek is moving to lead a $400 million seed round for a Chinese robotics AI startup (October 12, 2026; relaying Bloomberg)](https://qz.com/deepseek-winverse-ai-robotics-seed-round-101226)
- [Times of AI: DeepSeek Nears an 80B-Yuan Round and Moonshot Closes at ~$50B](https://timesof.ai/2026/10/deepseek-80b-yuan-moonshot-50b-pre-ipo-rounds)