Alibaba

Alibaba has officially claimed development of HappyHorse-1.0, an AI video generation model that quickly topped global leaderboards. This move signifies a major step in Alibaba’s AI expansion. The model, initially unbranded, excelled in text-to-video and image-to-video generation, sparking widespread speculation. Alibaba’s stock saw an increase following the confirmation, underscoring the strategic importance of AI for the company amidst intense competition and challenges faced by other tech giants in the generative video space.

Alibaba has launched the XuanTie C950, a new CPU designed for AI agentic capabilities. Built on the RISC-V architecture, this chip aims to enhance AI inference in data centers. The development signifies Alibaba’s ongoing investment in in-house semiconductor innovation, driven by a need for supply chain resilience and cost reduction, particularly in light of US export restrictions on advanced chips. While a technological advancement, its immediate revenue impact may be limited by production capacity.

Alibaba significantly reduced its workforce by about 34% in 2025, cutting over 66,000 employees. This move aligns with divestitures of offline retail assets and a strong pivot towards artificial intelligence. The company aims to become a full-stack AI enterprise, targeting over $100 billion in annual revenue from cloud and AI within five years, despite recent profit and revenue declines.

Alibaba reported a 66% year-over-year net income decline in its fiscal third quarter, missing revenue estimates. The e-commerce giant is heavily investing in AI and cloud infrastructure, prioritizing long-term growth over immediate profits. CEO Eddie Wu highlighted strong AI-driven revenue growth in its Cloud Intelligence Group, with AI-related products seeing triple-digit growth for ten consecutive quarters. The company is committed to AI, planning significant investments and developing new AI models and agentic commerce capabilities.

Alibaba has launched Wukong, an enterprise AI agent tool managing multiple AI agents through a unified, secure interface. Wukong handles tasks like document editing, research, and meeting transcription, acting proactively beyond user prompts. Named after the Monkey King, it’s available as a desktop app and integrated with DingTalk, with future expansion to platforms like Slack and WeChat, and Alibaba’s e-commerce ecosystem. This launch coincides with Alibaba’s major restructuring and its focus on AI tokens.

Alibaba has launched its Qwen3.5 large language model series, featuring enhanced reasoning and native multimodal capabilities. The open-weight version offers flexibility for developers, while a hosted version is available on Alibaba Cloud. With 397 billion parameters and support for 201 languages, Qwen3.5 aims to compete with global AI leaders and addresses the growing trend of AI agents capable of autonomous task execution, amidst intense domestic competition from companies like ByteDance and Zhipu AI.

Chinese tech giants like Alibaba, ByteDance, and Kuaishou are rapidly advancing AI, challenging Western dominance. Alibaba’s RynnBrain enhances robot capabilities, while ByteDance’s Seedance 2.0 and Kuaishou’s Kling 3.0 push the boundaries of AI video generation. Other firms like Zhipu AI and MiniMax are also releasing competitive AI models, signaling China’s growing prowess in the global AI landscape.

Alibaba has launched RynnBrain, an AI model for robotics, to enhance robots’ environmental understanding and object recognition. This strategic move places Alibaba in the competitive “physical AI” sector, alongside global giants like Nvidia, Google, and Tesla, all racing to advance AI in robotics. By open-sourcing RynnBrain, Alibaba aims to accelerate its adoption and innovation in this rapidly expanding field.

China’s tech giants, including Alibaba and ByteDance, are pioneering “agentic commerce.” Their advanced AI chatbots now autonomously manage shopping tasks, from product recommendations to payment processing, all within a single chat interface. This evolution moves beyond basic AI, enabling autonomous agents to execute user requests with minimal oversight. E-commerce is an early frontier for this technology, with Chinese firms leveraging their integrated ecosystems to gain a competitive edge.

Alibaba launched its first smart‑glasses, the Quark AI Glasses, in two models (S1 at ¥3,799 and G1 at ¥1,899). Integrated with Alibaba’s Qwen large‑language model and the new Qwen app, they offer voice‑activated translation, real‑time meeting transcription, product price lookup on Taobao, and AR visual recognition. The S1 features a higher‑resolution display. Alibaba aims to expand its consumer‑AI ecosystem, betting on rapid growth in AR wearables—projected to exceed 10 million shipments by 2026—while facing price, battery and supply‑chain challenges.