Alibaba said it is working on a competitor to ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence chatbot that has created a buzz around the world. Alibaba said its own product is currently undergoing internal testing.
Quang Da | Visual China Group | Getty Images
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba told CNBC on Wednesday that it is working on a competitor to ChatGPT, joining a flurry of tech firms to join the chatbot craze.
A company spokesperson said the company is working on ChatGPT-style technology and it is currently undergoing internal testing at the firm.
Alibaba shares jumped 3% in US premarket trading
The move comes as tech companies around the world look to capitalize on the buzz created by ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence chatbot created by OpenAI. Users can ask ChatGPT questions on a wide variety of topics, write essays, and even generate code.
ChatGPT falls under the category of generative artificial intelligence, a type of artificial intelligence that can be used to generate text or images.
Alibaba has said it has been working on generative artificial intelligence since 2017. The company did not give a timeline for when it might launch its rival ChatGPT.
ChatGPT has sparked something of an AI arms race among the world’s biggest tech players. Microsoft has invested in OpenAI and this week announced its AI-powered Bing search engine and Edge browser, which will be powered by ChatGPT technology.
Also this week, Google announced its AI chatbot technology called Bard as part of a “code red” plan to answer the ChatGPT challenge.
Chinese search giant Baidu said it is testing its own chatbot this week, called “Ernie bot” in English or “Wenxin Yiyan” in Chinese. The announcement sent the stock soaring, underscoring investor excitement about the technology.
Alibaba, one of China’s biggest cloud computing players and the country’s largest e-commerce company, has hinted that its own chatbot could be integrated into its products.
“As a technology leader, we will continue to invest in turning cutting-edge innovations into value-added applications for our customers as well as their end users through cloud services,” an Alibaba spokesperson told CNBC.
