(Feb 16): Alibaba Group Holding Ltd unveiled a major upgrade of its flagship AI model, accelerating a race with a panoply of startups and sectoral leaders aiming to get in ahead of Chinese sensation DeepSeek’s next big platform. Alibaba has been among the most aggressive investors in and advocates for AI since DeepSeek reinvigorated the local tech industry. It rolled out last month its latest reasoning model, Qwen3-Max-Thinking, aiming for performance gains in areas like complex reasoning and autonomous agent capabilities. Beyond fundamental technological advancement, Alibaba is also locked in a costly subsidy war in AI with rivals including Tencent Holdings Ltd and Baidu Inc. Its 100 million users can now order bubble tea and book travel via agents within the app.

Source: The Edge Markets February 16, 2026 09:32 UTC