Benchmarking OpenAI, Zhipu plans to strive for the domestic "AI first stock," with a monthly fee of only 20 RMB

Benchmarking against OpenAI, the Chinese artificial intelligence startup Zhipu AI is sprinting towards its goal of becoming China's "first AI stock" with its rapidly growing revenue and clear commercialization path. On the business front, Zhipu AI has also made key progress in commercialization. According to media reports citing the company's co-founder and CEO Daniel Zhang, its annual recurring revenue (ARR) from selling software tools and model access to developers has surpassed 100 million yuan (approximately 14 million USD). Since the launch of its flagship model GLM-4.5 in July this year, the number of users for this subscription service has increased tenfold in just two months. Media reports cite an informed source stating that Zhipu AI's total revenue is expected to reach 42 million USD in 2024, with sales projected to more than double in 2025. According to Xinhua News, Zhipu AI submitted its listing guidance filing to the Beijing Securities Regulatory Bureau of the China Securities Regulatory Commission on April 14, 2025, with China International Capital Corporation serving as the advisory institution. According to the plan, the company expects to complete the guidance by October 2025 and may list on the A-share market as early as 2026. This startup, valued at over 3 billion USD, has received support from well-known investors including Alibaba Group and Tencent Holdings. As its revenue sources expand from traditional government agencies and state-owned enterprises to a broader developer community and corporate clients, Zhipu AI is attempting to be the first to complete its listing in the Chinese market post-ChatGPT era. Low-price strategy breakthrough, API platform attracts millions of paid users The core of Zhipu AI's commercialization path lies in its highly attractive pricing strategy. The company positions itself as a challenger with top-notch technology and significant cost advantages. CEO Daniel Zhang has stated: "Our model is good enough—among the world's top tier. We have a huge advantage in price and cost." He even joked that if Anthropic's product sells for 200 USD, Zhipu AI would sell for 200 yuan. This strategy has been validated in practice. A company spokesperson stated that Zhipu AI's application programming interface (API) business platform has served over 2.7 million paid customers, including major Chinese tech companies. In September 2024, the company launched a new subscription plan for its AI programming assistant, with a monthly fee as low as 20 yuan, about one-seventh the price of Anthropic's similar product Claude, and has currently attracted over 150,000 users. According to media reports citing informed sources, Zhipu AI's total revenue is expected to reach 42 million USD in 2024, with sales projected to more than double in 2025. Daniel Zhang stated that the company's goal is to ultimately have revenue from its tools business account for half of its total revenue Zhang Peng believes that the Chinese market is currently still in a stage where high-quality AI services are in short supply. "The market has picked up, demand has risen, and people are now willing to pay," he stated, adding that a key issue that needs to be addressed is meeting the surging demand for AI query processing (i.e., inference), "But can the inference resources keep up?" Model capabilities on par with top levels, aiming for China's "first AI stock" The confidence behind Zhipu AI's sprint towards an IPO comes not only from its commercial success but also from its strong technical prowess. The company's GLM-4.5 model released in July this year and the GLM-4.6 model released in September have gained global attention for their powerful capabilities, with the latter's latest enhancements primarily focused on improving coding and AI agent capabilities. According to the rankings on the model benchmarking website LMArena, Zhipu AI's GLM-4.6, along with models like DeepSeek, Alibaba's Qwen, and Kimi from the Dark Side of the Moon, are all listed as part of the first tier, just behind Silicon Valley's top models. Notably, media reports have indicated that OpenAI's global affairs team has also warned that Zhipu AI represents a "significant advancement" and challenge. With confidence in its technology and rapid commercialization progress, Zhipu AI is competing with Shanghai-based startup Minimax, known for audio and video generation, to become the first publicly listed AI model developer in China. "We deserve this title," Zhang Peng stated: "We have naturally arrived at this point without forcing it. But it's like the last kilometer of a marathon; you must accelerate." Zhipu AI was founded in 2019, stemming from the technology transfer of Tsinghua University's Computer Science Department. Since its establishment, the company has been favored by capital and has completed multiple rounds of financing. Its list of shareholders includes well-known investment institutions such as Hillhouse Capital, Qiming Venture Partners, and Junlian Capital, as well as strategic investments from internet giants like Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan, and Xiaomi