Alibaba expands consumer AI strategy – Digital Commerce 360
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Alibaba Group has unveiled a new consumer-facing AI chatbot and a line of smart glasses under its Quark brand, marking the company’s latest move to extend artificial intelligence from enterprise applications into daily consumer use.
Alibaba launched the Quark AI Chat Assistant on Oct. 23. It introduces a conversational mode powered by Alibaba’s Qwen3 large language models (LLMs) within the Quark app. This feature lets users toggle between text- or voice-based dialogue and traditional search, creating a unified interface for accessing information, performing tasks, and holding natural conversations.
Alibaba owns the world’s two largest online marketplaces by gross merchandise value (GMV), Taobao and Tmall. Taobao ranks No. 1 in the Global Online Marketplaces Database, Digital Commerce 360’s ranking of the largest such marketplaces by GMV. Tmall ranks No. 2. Both platforms operate in China and primarily serve the Chinese market. Among Alibaba’s other marketplaces is the global B2B marketplace Alibaba.com.
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The assistant supports multimodal interactions — including photo-based problem solving, AI writing, photo editing and voice calling. Consumers can access it by selecting “assistant” in the Quark AI Super Box. Alternatively, they can swipe right on the app’s home screen.
“With the newly added feature, Quark provides a dual engine of AI search and conversation, delivering a complete AI experience that both gets you straight to the information you need and enables deeper exploration,” Alibaba said.
According to Alibaba, the chatbot is powered by the company’s Qwen3 models, which deliver stronger reasoning and execution capabilities than previous generations. Future updates will integrate Model Context Protocol (MCP) tools from across Alibaba’s ecosystem to enhance task automation and third-party connectivity.
Alongside the chatbot debut, Alibaba announced the Quark AI Glasses, its first self-developed smart eyewear powered by Qwen and Quark’s multimodal AI engine. Pre-sales begin Oct. 24 on Tmall, Alibaba’s flagship ecommerce marketplace, with shipments scheduled to start in December.
Sign up for a complimentary subscription to Digital Commerce 360 B2B News. It covers technology and business trends in the growing B2B ecommerce industry. Contact Mark Brohan, senior vice president of B2B and Market Research, at mark@digitalcommerce360.com. Follow him on Twitter @markbrohan. Follow us on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), Facebook and YouTube.
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