Alibaba Transforms Quark Into Powerful AI Super Assistant

Alibaba Group Holding has revamped its web-search and cloud-storage tool Quark into a super artificial intelligence (AI) assistant, signalling the tech giant’s efforts to strengthen its foothold in the emerging field of AI agents.

Alibaba’s Qwen series powers the latest edition of Quark

The reasoning model of Alibaba’s Qwen series powers the latest edition of Quark. In addition to deep thinking and job execution capabilities, the “all-in-one AI super assistant” can handle activities ranging from medical diagnostics to academic research, the Hangzhou-based business claimed Thursday that it boasts sophisticated capabilities like a chatbot. 

Alibaba said that this was the first time it has completely merged its proprietary foundation models into companies that deal directly with customers. The action was taken as China’s competition for AI agents intensifies and large tech firms scramble to build their own user bases.

All users will eventually have access to New Quark, with a pilot program beginning on Thursday

All users will eventually have access to New Quark, with a pilot program beginning on Thursday. Alibaba’s R1-Omni model, which it claimed could read emotions, was released the day before this one. After Hangzhou-based DeepSeek startled Silicon Valley with a concept similar to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, but reportedly developed at a quarter of the cost, both companies join a flurry of product upgrades and announcements from Chinese companies.

According to Wu Jia, CEO of Quark and a vice-president at Alibaba, the redesigned Quark is intended to serve as a portal to “endless possibilities where users can explore everything with AI” as Alibaba’s model capabilities continue to advance.

According to Alibaba, the updated version enables users to ask difficult queries and follow up with more detailed information on a subject right within the search engines.

Alibaba introduced Quark in 2016

They introduced Quark in 2016; at first, it was a web browser. According to the company’s data, it has amassed over 200 million subscribers in China over the previous nine years. 

The decision also reflects the company’s larger AI plan, which group CEO Eddie Wu Yongming revealed last month and calls for investments in three key areas over the next several years.

 

Wu stated in a February conference call with analysts that the company would increase its investments in cloud computing and AI, foundation models, and AI-native applications in addition to using the technology to improve its current companies. The third area is the Quark redesign.