DeepSeek shockwave: Alibaba, Xiaomi, and ByteDance in AI talent "three-way battle"
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DeepSeek shockwave: Alibaba, Xiaomi, and ByteDance in AI talent "three-way battle"
In the booming AI sector, talent has become a key resource in the competition among companies.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Huang Xinyi, Cailian Press AI Daily
Image source: Generated by Wujie AI
On Thursday, Apple and Google's U.S. app stores lifted download restrictions on TikTok, relisting the application. Weeks earlier, both platforms had removed TikTok in compliance with a related U.S. ban. Following DeepSeek's global breakout, major Chinese internet and tech companies have accelerated their competition for AI talent. After moves by Xiaomi and ByteDance, Cailian Press has learned that Alibaba's AI-to-C business has recently launched large-scale recruitment, opening hundreds of positions primarily focused on AI large model-related product and technology R&D roles.
Alibaba has been highly active recently in AI and cloud computing. After confirming its smartphone AI collaboration with Apple, Jack Ma has also made several public appearances—visiting Quark's office within Alibaba’s Smart Information事业群 last week, followed by attending a private enterprise symposium in Beijing on February 17.
It is reported that Alibaba is now recruiting several hundred external positions, with AI technology and product development roles accounting for 90%. These are mainly distributed across AI products and AI technology R&D, focusing on cutting-edge technologies and applications such as text, multimodal large models, and AI Agents.
Race for AI Talent Among Xiaomi, ByteDance, and Alibaba
As the AI sector thrives, talent has become a key competitive resource. Recently, news that Xiaomi recruited Luo Fuli, a prodigy from DeepSeek, drew widespread attention. Luo Fuli, a post-95s AI rising star, earned her bachelor's degree in computer science from Beijing Normal University and her master's in computational linguistics from Peking University. She achieved remarkable academic success, publishing eight papers at the top-tier ACL conference, two as first author. Her proposed word sense disambiguation method and text style transfer framework caused a sensation in the industry.
Yesterday, ByteDance confirmed to Cailian Press reporters that Wu Yonghui, a "Google Fellow" who worked at Google for 17 years, has left the company and officially joined ByteDance. At ByteDance, Wu will lead foundational research as head of the Seed team for large models, focusing on long-term explorations such as fundamental large model research and AI for science, reporting directly to CEO Liang Rubo.
DeepSeek's global impact—achieved despite limited funding and talent advantages—has shaken all major tech firms. During a recent all-hands meeting, Liang Rubo stated that one of DeepSeek R1's innovations, long-chain reasoning, was not originally pioneered by the industry. After OpenAI launched its long-chain reasoning model in September last year and sparked industry interest, ByteDance recognized the technological shift but failed to follow up quickly enough. Had they acted sooner, they could have achieved similar results earlier. He set a key goal for 2025: pursuing the upper limit of "intelligence."
In contrast, Alibaba has consistently invested heavily in acquiring AI talent. In early February, Xu Zhuhong, a world-class AI scientist and former Salesforce Group Vice President, joined Alibaba as Group Vice President, responsible for multimodal foundational models and related research and application solutions for AI-to-C services. Insiders revealed that Xu is currently building a top-tier AI large model research team exceeding 100 people, aiming to translate frontier scientific achievements into practical application solutions.
Alibaba has long been involved in AI but previously focused mainly on B2B operations. The Q3 2024 earnings report showed Alibaba Cloud generated revenue of 29.61 billion yuan, up over 7% year-on-year, with adjusted EBITA profit reaching 2.661 billion yuan, an 89% year-on-year increase. Alibaba Cloud's performance was driven by double-digit growth in public cloud services, including increased adoption of AI-related products, which have recorded triple-digit year-on-year revenue growth for five consecutive quarters.
Starting at the end of last year, Alibaba intensified efforts in AI-to-C initiatives, integrating its AI application "Tongyi" into the Smart Information事业群, entrusting this division with leading Alibaba's AI-to-C strategy. Last week, Alibaba founder Jack Ma visited the Quark office, greeting and interacting with employees.
Alibaba Fully Embraces Technology Over E-commerce Under “AI-Driven” Strategy
Recently, Alibaba also confirmed its partnership with Apple to develop new AI features for iPhone users in China. Beyond smartphones, Alibaba is advancing the deployment of its Tongyi series of large models into AI glasses, including signing with consumer AR brand RayNeo to provide exclusive technical support for their AI glasses. The Tmall Genie team is also collaborating with Quark’s product team to explore new hardware directions like AI glasses.
On the cloud infrastructure front, Alibaba Cloud announced today that its Mexico data center is now operational—the first Alibaba Cloud facility in Latin America, marking a significant step into South America. In May last year, Alibaba Cloud unveiled a new global infrastructure expansion plan, investing in new data centers in Thailand, Mexico, Malaysia, the Philippines, and South Korea. Alibaba Cloud now spans 87 availability zones across 29 regions worldwide.
On February 20, Alibaba will release its third-quarter financial results for fiscal year 2025. Morgan Stanley published a report expecting mentions of future capital expenditure plans and public cloud revenue outlook in the earnings call. If Alibaba announces increased investment in AI, it would further boost order expectations across the entire data center industry.
For Alibaba, the collaboration with Apple represents a major commercial breakthrough since launching its "AI-driven" strategy. Regarding the prospects of the Apple partnership, analysts at Countpoint believe Apple may adopt a multi-supplier model in China going forward, bringing in more large model service providers. As the pioneer in this collaboration, Alibaba will enjoy a period of exclusive cooperation. As the market evolves, companies like Baidu, ByteDance, and DeepSeek could also become potential suppliers. "We forecast that Apple Intelligence supporting Chinese—the first non-English version—will officially launch within 2025."
Zhang Yi, CEO of iiMedia Consulting, told Cailian Press that after partnering with Apple, Alibaba's AI products will gain intimate, direct access to end consumers along with real-world application scenarios—offering substantial value for Alibaba's future commercialization. Moreover, Alibaba is more than just an e-commerce platform; it possesses a robust ecosystem including Gaode Maps and entertainment services. If these can resonate with Apple's data, especially through commercial data collaborations, the possibilities are vast.
Not only Alibaba but also Ant Group, closely tied to Alibaba, has been making active moves lately. Recent job postings indicate Ant Group is hiring for roles related to embodied intelligence humanoid robot systems and applications. An Ant Group spokesperson said that last year, the company registered Ant Lingbo Technology Co., Ltd., focusing on embodied intelligence technology and product development. "Ant Group continues to expand its布局 and increase investments in AI."
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