Alibaba Unveils Qwen3.8-Max AI Model to Challenge Global Leaders -

Alibaba Group has introduced its latest flagship artificial intelligence model, Qwen3.8-Max, claiming performance that rivals some of the world’s most advanced AI systems, including Anthropic’s Fable 5, as competition in the global AI industry continues to intensify.

According to Alibaba, the new model is built on 2.4 trillion parameters and outperforms or matches leading AI models on several industry benchmarks.

The company said Qwen3.8-Max also surpasses the recently launched Kimi K3, developed by Chinese AI startup Moonshot, in multiple performance tests.

Alibaba said the model demonstrates strong capabilities in autonomous coding and long-horizon task execution. During internal testing, Qwen3.8-Max reportedly completed a software engineering project independently over a period of 16 days.

The company also said the model uses a more efficient architecture that activates only the computing resources required for a given task, helping reduce costs and improve response times.

The launch comes amid rapid advances in China’s AI sector, with companies including Moonshot, DeepSeek, Z.ai and ByteDance accelerating the development of increasingly capable large language models despite US restrictions on advanced AI chips.

Alibaba plans to release the model’s weights for public download next week, allowing developers and enterprises to customize and fine-tune the system for their own applications.

The move is expected to strengthen the company’s position in the growing open-source AI ecosystem and intensify competition among Chinese AI developers.

Commenting on the development, Vey-Sern Ling, Managing Director at Union Bancaire Privée, said many investors continue to underestimate the progress of Chinese AI companies because of US chip restrictions.

He noted that the technological gap between Chinese and Western AI models is narrowing rapidly, with Alibaba’s latest release providing further evidence of China’s growing capabilities in artificial intelligence.-ERMD/TS

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