On September 10, 2026, DeepSeek officially released its V4.1 Flash model. According to internal and external testing, the new model comprehensively surpasses the previous V4 Pro in performance, response speed, computational cost, and total processing time. The model adopts a new architecture with native multimodal support.
Simultaneously, DeepSeek announced a major price reduction for the Flash series. Starting from September 10, the cache-hit input price dropped from 0.05 RMB to 0.02 RMB per million tokens, a 60% reduction. The cache-miss input price was reduced by 60% as well. All requests previously routed to V4 Pro will be automatically redirected to V4.1 Flash at the new pricing.
On the same day, sources confirmed that DeepSeek has engaged CITIC Securities to prepare for a STAR Market IPO, with CITic having entered the due diligence phase. The company plans to initiate the listing process within the year, though no formal listing guidance agreement has been signed yet.
DeepSeek's valuation has reached approximately 500 billion RMB following its latest funding round, making it the highest-valued company among the "Hangzhou Six Little Dragons." The company raised over 50 billion RMB in its first external funding round in June 2026, with founder Liang Wenfeng personally contributing 20 billion RMB, and Tencent, CATL, JD, and NetEase also participating.
Source: Science and Technology Innovation Board Daily / Eastmoney
