OpenAI and Anthropic are making 10 times more revenue than all Chinese AI models combined, research group Rhodium says
- ID
- 25467
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 17 Sep 2026, 5:00 PM
- Fetched
- 17 Sep 2026, 5:30 PM
- Provider
- CNBC Technology
- Category
- technology
- Original URL
- https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/17/chinas-ai-models-make-only-10percent-of-us-leaders-revenue-rhodium.html
- Source URL
- https://www.cnbc.com/id/19854910/device/rss/rss.html
Summary
- Score
- 6.5
- Created
- 17 Sep 2026, 5:31 PM
- Tags
- Audience
- developersai_ml_learnerssaas_founders
What happened
Rhodium Group estimates all Chinese AI models combined generate only ~10% of the revenue that OpenAI and Anthropic do, with DeepSeek at $500M ARR, MiniMax at $800M, Moonshot at $1B, Z.ai at $1.8B, ByteDance at $4B, and Alibaba at $2.4B—versus OpenAI alone at $40B ARR. Rhodium called Moonshot and DeepSeek valuations 'exorbitant' relative to revenue.
Why it matters
If you're choosing between US and Chinese model APIs for cost savings, Chinese providers likely have strong pricing pressure to gain market share, which could mean continued aggressive discounts—but also financial sustainability risk. Builders relying on DeepSeek or Moonshot APIs should factor in that these providers are generating a fraction of the revenue needed to sustain frontier-scale compute spend.
Discussion angle
Should Malaysian builders bet on cheaper Chinese model APIs (DeepSeek, Moonshot) for cost arbitrage, or stick with OpenAI/Anthropic for revenue-stability and ecosystem maturity—especially given the 10x revenue gap suggests Chinese providers may need to raise prices or cut compute to survive?