Alibaba Group, China’s tech and e-commerce giant, is set to release an upgraded version of its flagship AI model, Qwen 3, possibly later this month, according to a Bloomberg News report on Tuesday while the release is expected in April, the exact timing could still be subject to change.
The move comes amid fierce competition in the AI sector, with companies rapidly rolling out new products in response to the rise of China’s DeepSeek earlier this year. DeepSeek gained global attention by unveiling a model that it claimed was more cost-effective to develop than its Western counterparts, prompting rivals to accelerate their AI advancements.
Alibaba quickly responded to DeepSeek’s success in January by releasing Qwen 2.5-Max, an upgraded version of its AI model. The release came just days after DeepSeek launched its DeepSeek-V3, with Alibaba asserting that Qwen 2.5-Max had outperformed the model.