Alibaba commits to spending $53 billion on AI
The Alibaba Group is going all in on AI as it announces plans to invest at least $53 billion over the next three years to boost its cloud computing and AI infrastructure.
The investment marks a major turning point in the brand’s history as the sum of money exceeds its total AI and cloud spending over the last decade.
This comes after CEO Eddie Wu shared the group’s latest earnings from the last quarter, with him describing AI as a “once-in-a-generation” opportunity on a call. Within the reporting, an interest in Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) was made clear as a long-term objective.
In a blog post sharing the news, it explains how “cloud computing remains Alibaba’s clearest revenue driver in AI, with demand for AI hosting services surging.”
The company’s Cloud Intelligence Group’s revenue has grown 11% year-over-year, while its AI-related product revenue recently posted triple-digit growth for the sixth consecutive quarter.
Alibaba expects AI to play major role in number of services“The company expects AI to play an increasingly integral role across e-commerce, enterprise services, and consumer applications, enhancing efficiency, user engagement, and business innovation,” it said in a statement.
In a previously spoken about strategic decision, Eddie Wu explained how a “user-first, AI-driven” approach would be taken. This includes embedding AI across its ecosystem to enhance customer experiences, and business operations and to fuel long-term growth.
“With this investment, Alibaba is scaling up its AI capabilities and cloud infrastructure to support the next wave of technological advancements, ensuring businesses and developers have the tools to innovate and grow.”
While many may associate the Alibaba group with its company Aliexpress, known for offering products with extremely cheap prices, the group is expansive and is already in the AI space.
It was at the end of January when it unveiled its latest large language model, version Qwen 2.5. It’s this range of models that has put the company as a front-runner in China in the AI industry.
According to the South China Morning Post, one of the Qwen models outperformed “those from domestic rivals to rank third globally behind OpenAI and Anthropic.”
Featured Image: Via Alibaba Group resources
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