Kuaishou Technology, the Chinese short-video platform, is reportedly planning to spin off its Kling AI video generation unit as an independent company and take it public by 2027. The target valuation: $20 billion.
Kuaishou’s own market capitalization sat at roughly $25 billion as of April 2026. Spinning off an AI subsidiary at nearly 80% of your parent company’s value is either a bold statement about where future growth lives, or an exercise in creative accounting.
The Kling AI backstory
Kling AI launched in June 2024 with a straightforward pitch: type in text, get back a high-quality video. The tool generates 1080p videos up to two minutes long, which placed it squarely in competition with OpenAI’s Sora and Runway’s suite of video models.
The initial report of Kuaishou’s IPO plans came from the South China Morning Post on May 5, 2026, citing anonymous sources. Kuaishou itself has not confirmed the move publicly.
Kuaishou posted $4.1 billion in revenue during Q1 2026, a 15% jump year-over-year.
Why a spin-off, and why now
By separating Kling into its own entity, Kuaishou could theoretically unlock what analysts estimate to be $5 billion to $10 billion in additional shareholder value.
What this means for investors
The $20 billion target valuation would make Kling one of the most valuable standalone AI companies globally before it has even proven itself as an independent business, as a unit that’s less than three years old.
The competitive landscape has gotten significantly more crowded since Kling’s launch. OpenAI’s Sora continues to evolve, Runway has deepened its enterprise offerings, and a raft of smaller startups have entered the text-to-video space.
Chinese tech companies pursuing IPOs face a regulatory environment that has been unpredictable at best and hostile at worst over the past several years. The 2027 timeline gives Kuaishou some runway, but regulatory delays have derailed more certain deals than this one.
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