Alibaba cements AI leadership as cloud unit reports fastest growth since 2022
Alibaba Group Holding's cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) unit continued to deliver a strong performance in the fourth quarter of its financial year ended March 31, as the company pushes for the technology's increased adoption in more traditional industries.
The company's cloud computing and AI unit reported an 18 per cent revenue increase for the March quarter, representing the unit's fastest growth since 2022, as AI-related sales recorded triple-digit growth for the seventh consecutive quarter. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
'In cloud computing, it has clear market leadership as the backbone of digitalisation across different industries,' Jefferies analysts Thomas Chong and Zoey Zong said in a research note on Thursday.
During an earnings call on Thursday, Alibaba chief executive Eddie Wu Yongming highlighted internet services, autonomous driving, financial services and online education as areas seeing faster AI adoption. Meanwhile, the Hangzhou-based company is seeing growing momentum from more traditional industries such as animal farming and manufacturing, he added.
The logos of Alibaba and its Qwen AI model are seen in this illustration taken January 29, 2025. Photo: Reuters
The company recently signed a major deal with the state-backed Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, which adopted Alibaba Cloud's database service PolarDB as its enterprise-wide transactional distributed database.
'This represents a strong endorsement of our technological capabilities by one of the most demanding financial institutions in terms of business performance and technology requirements,' Wu said.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
South China Morning Post
an hour ago
- South China Morning Post
AI might be answer to China's labour woes, but could also fuel deflation, report says
While the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is set to mitigate an expected shortage of labour in China in the long run, market observers differ on its impact on deflationary pressures in the near term. Advertisement The wider adoption of AI in China could exacerbate 'China's prevailing deflationary pressures' by disrupting an already-weak employment market, as the labour displacement effects of the technology might dominate in the short term, Morgan Stanley analysts said in a research report published last month. 'In China, the AI-induced labour market disruption could potentially prove more acute, given that the economy has a weak starting point of high youth unemployment problems and deflation,' they said. With AI potentially taking over 'junior-level cognitive work', companies might be encouraged to spend more on adopting the technology, with reduced hiring 'leading to more severe wage growth deceleration', the report said. But Ding Shuang, chief Greater China economist at Standard Chartered, said AI would not be a driving force of deflationary pressure in China as the main causes were overcapacity in some industries and sluggish domestic demand. Advertisement 'To combat deflationary pressure, China should curb overinvestment and excessive competition, but not hesitate to develop AI for fear of deflation, as AI is a strategically important industry,' Ding said.
South China Morning Post
an hour ago
- South China Morning Post
China's Hainan offers global internet access to some to boost free-trade port ambitions
China's southernmost province of Hainan is piloting a programme to grant select corporate users broad access to the global internet, a rare move in a country known for having some of the world's most restrictive online censorship, as the island seeks to transform itself into a global free-trade port. Advertisement Employees of companies registered and operating in Hainan can apply for the 'Global Connect' mobile service through the Hainan International Data Comprehensive Service Centre (HIDCSC), according to the agency, which is overseen by the state-run Hainan Big Data Development Centre. The programme allows eligible users to bypass the so-called Great Firewall, which blocks access to many of the world's most-visited websites, such as Google and Wikipedia. Applicants must be on a 5G plan with one of the country's three major state-backed carriers – China Mobile China Unicom or China Telecom – and submit their employer's information, including the company's Unified Social Credit Code, for approval. The process can take up to five months, HIDCSC staff said. Once approved, users will gain access to the global internet at no additional cost, according to an HIDCSC representative, who declined to be named because the person was not authorised to speak to news media. There are currently no restrictions on company size or business scope, and the service has attracted significant business interest, the person said. Advertisement
South China Morning Post
2 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
Donald Trump and Xi Jinping speak on phone call, breaking months-long stand-off
Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone with his US counterpart, Donald Trump, on Thursday, Chinese state media reported. Advertisement The call came after Washington and Beijing traded accusations of breaching a deal reached just weeks ago in Geneva, where the world's two biggest economies had agreed to dramatically cut mutual tariffs for 90 days , an outcome Trump dubbed a 'total reset'. It was their first phone call since the two countries started imposing fresh duties on each other's goods in February. The conversationhas been widely seen on both sides as the highest political endorsement for de-escalating the trade war , which threatened to reshape global trade flows for the coming decades. Tensions between the world's two biggest economies have flared again in recent weeks. Advertisement
