Alibaba Makes A Big AI Leap As Technology Continues To Evolve From Being A Useful Tool To A Genuine Game Changer

Just one day after Meta Platforms Inc META launched its A.I. model fine-tuned for writing computer code, China just made a big leap in the A.I. race with Alibaba Holdings Limited BABA releasing a new chatbot similar to the one backed by Microsoft Corporation MSFT. On Friday, Alibaba announced the release of two new A.I. models, Qwen-VL and Qwen-VL-Chat, that dramatically level up the the specter of AI possibilities.

Qwen-VL And Qwen-VL-Chat

The two open-source models that Alibaba developed are vision language models which implies that unlike the competing Microsoft-backed ChatGPT and Google Bard that read text, Alibaba’s models are able to ‘read’ and act upon images.

Based on photos, Qwen-VL-Chat is able to provide directions from street signs, solve math equations and even make a narrative that brings pictures together. The other release, Qwen-VL is simply a higher-resolution update of the existing image-reading chatbot.

Evolving From A Useful Tool To A Genuine Game-Changer

Alibaba finds that the image-scanning technology has significant opportunities to increase the quality of life of visually impaired people, such as by reading a label for them when they go out shopping.

Catching Up To Meta

It’s no secret that Alibaba has been trying to catch up to Meta with AI rollouts, but Meta remains ahead, just like China remains behind the U.S. on this front. However, the two tech giant became frenemies in July by making an agreement that made Meta-made Llama 2 model enter the Chinese market through Alibaba, or more precisely, its cloud unit. Built on its open-source Llama 2 model that was released in July, Meta fine-tuned its AI model to both generate computer code, as well as help review and if needed, fix, programming language. But the Meta-made Llama 2 model is based on about 70 billion parameters and is therefore, about 10 times larger than Alibaba’s new releases. However, Alibaba claims to have bigger models but they are not open-source.

Yet, Meta is charging ahead as Wall Street Journal reported it is developing an even more powerful model to compete with GPT-4, the latest version of Microsoft-backed Open AI’s large language model. 

The AI Contest Between China And The US 

On several occasions, the Chinese government indicated that A.I. is an essential part of its technology future but Chinese tech companies seem to be behind their U.S. peers. But despite the advantage the U.S. currently enjoys, Fortune.com reported that government officials are concerned the Chinese government will ultimately find its way to the A.I. technology being developed by private firms and use it for military purposes.

Meanwhile, following its biggest-ever restructuring, Alibaba CEO Eddie Wu reiterated that Alibaba continues to explore ways of integrating AI innovations across its businesses in order to stay relevant in this ever-evolving business landscape. 

DISCLAIMER: This content is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as investing advice.