A wide range of entrepreneurs and industry leaders are vying for a spot ahead of Chinese phenomenon DeepSeek’s next big platform after Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. revealed a significant improvement of its main AI model.
Alibaba stated in a statement on Monday that the most recent version of Qwen is made to support AI agent jobs and is capable of comprehending text, photo, and video inputs. It further stated that it can analyze videos up to two hours in length.
In the weeks preceding the Lunar New Year, competitors ranging from ByteDance Ltd. to Zhipu and Minimax Group Inc. published a rush of updates, including Alibaba’s Qwen3.5. Around the first anniversary of the groundbreaking R1, which upended international AI conventions in 2025, they want to steal a march on a highly anticipated DeepSeek release. A weeklong holiday that has historically been crucial for the uptake of Chinese consumer internet apps is another goal Alibaba and its competitors are aiming for.
Since DeepSeek revitalized the regional tech sector, Alibaba has been one of the most active supporters of AI and an investment in it. Eddie Wu, the CEO, has committed more than $53 billion to the development of AI and infrastructure, an amount he stated the business might eventually exceed.
In April of last year, Alibaba upgraded its flagship model to the Qwen3 series. Last month, it released Qwen3-Max-Thinking, its most recent reasoning model, with the goal of improving performance in domains like autonomous agent capabilities and sophisticated thinking.
Beyond basic technological development, Alibaba is engaged in an expensive AI subsidy battle with competitors like Baidu Inc. and Tencent Holdings Ltd. In an effort to draw and keep chatbot users over the holidays, the three want to implement a total of 4.5 billion yuan ($649 million) in cash incentives.
The Qwen app, which caters to consumers, is evolving into a comprehensive platform that integrates with other elements of Alibaba’s extensive e-commerce network. Now, its 100 million users may use the app to arrange vacation and get bubble tea through agents.
