Another domestic AI unicorn is sprinting toward a Hong Kong IPO! On December 21, MiniMax (Shanghai Xiyu Technology), a global leader in artificial general intelligence (AGI), released its post-hearing prospectus (PHIP). Founded just four years ago, MiniMax is poised to set a new record for AI company IPOs.
**High Growth, High Losses, and a Young Team with an Average Age of 29** MiniMax was established in early 2022. Its team is notably young, with founder Yan Junjie, born in 1989, previously serving as Vice President of SenseTime, Deputy Director of the Research Institute, and CTO of the Smart City Business Group, where he led the development of deep learning toolchains and AGI systems. As of September 2025, the company had 385 employees, with an average age of 29. Nearly 74% of the workforce is engaged in R&D, and the average age of board members is 32.
As a rapidly expanding, R&D-driven AI company, MiniMax’s financials reflect the "typical AI narrative" of high growth alongside significant losses. According to its prospectus, the company reported revenues of $2.46 million in 2023, $30.52 million in 2024, and $53.44 million in the first nine months of 2025. However, like many frontier tech firms in their investment phase, MiniMax’s financial performance has been heavily weighed down by high R&D and operational costs. From 2022 to 2024, net losses widened from $73.73 million to $465 million. In the first nine months of 2025 alone, losses reached $512 million, surpassing the previous year’s total.
R&D expenses during the reporting period were $10.56 million (2023), $70.00 million (2024), $189 million (2025 Q1-Q3), though the ratio of R&D spending to revenue has declined year-over-year—from 2023% (2023) to 337% (2025 Q1-Q3).
**Revenue Breakdown: AI Products and Enterprise Services** MiniMax’s revenue primarily comes from AI-native products and its open platform, along with other AI-based enterprise services. In the first three quarters of 2025, AI-native products accounted for 71.1% of total revenue, including the intelligent agent app MiniMax, visual generation platform Conch AI, audio generation tool MiniMax Voice, and multimodal interaction platform Talkie/Starfield. Notably, Conch AI contributed $174.64 billion (32.6% of total revenue), while Talkie/Starfield generated $187.5 billion (35.1%).
The open platform provides APIs and services to enterprise clients and developers, while other AI-based enterprise services include customized solutions for industries such as smart hardware, healthcare, culture/tourism, finance, and internet services. These segments accounted for 28.9% of total revenue in 2025 Q1-Q3.
With a consumer-focused strategy, over 70% of MiniMax’s revenue comes from overseas markets. In 2025 Q1-Q3, international markets contributed $390 million (73.1% of total revenue), with Singapore (24.3%) and the U.S. (20.4%) as key regions.
**Star-Studded Investor Lineup: Tencent, Alibaba, and miHoJo** MiniMax boasts a prestigious investor roster, having raised over $1.5 billion since inception. Strategic backers include miHoYo, Alibaba, Tencent, Xiaohongshu, Xiaomi, Kingsoft, PCG, and CP Group, while financial investors include Hillhouse Capital, IDG, Sequoia, Matrix Partners, and Yunqi Capital.
The prospectus also revealed details of MiniMax’s alliance with Alibaba. As of December 15, 2025, Alibaba Group indirectly held a 13.66% stake in MiniMax through an affiliate, with 3.64% voting rights. Chen Yingjie, General Manager of Alibaba’s Strategic Investment Department, serves as a non-executive director.
**Deepening Business Collaboration with Alibaba** Since 2022, MiniMax has increasingly purchased cloud computing services from Alibaba Cloud, with transaction amounts rising from $40,000 (2022) to $58.4 million (2025 Q1-Q3). Conversely, MiniMax began selling API services to Alibaba in 2023, generating $23,300 in revenue by 2025 Q1-Q3.
The two parties have agreed on multiple new API projects starting next year, with MiniMax committing to provide API services to Alibaba’s operations over the next three years. Revenue from this collaboration is expected to grow significantly, with projected API service volumes increasing by at least 200%. Meanwhile, MiniMax’s cloud spending with Alibaba is capped at $115 million (2026), $125 million (2027), and $135 million (2028).
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