Alibaba announced a 3 billion yuan (~$431 million) investment. The funds will promote its Qwen AI application ahead of and during the Lunar New Year holidays.
The campaign launches on February 6. It offers rewards for dining and entertainment through "large red envelopes" to attract and retain users. This strategic spending is nearly triple the amount pledged by competitors, aiming to boost user engagement on the AI platform.
Alibaba also expects to launch its new flagship AI model, Qwen 3.5, during the same holiday period. Qwen 3.5 is optimized for complex reasoning tasks. This move further intensifies regional AI competition.