Apple Intelligence launches in China with Alibaba’s Qwen AI

Apple Intelligence will launch in China with Alibaba’s Qwen AI as the default, following regulatory approval. The move boosted Alibaba’s shares and highlights US-China competition in AI.

Apple Intelligence has secured regulatory approval to launch in China, thanks to a partnership with Alibaba's Qwen AI. The Cyberspace Administration of China has listed Apple among approved generative AI providers, alongside major players like Huawei and Xiaomi. Alibaba confirmed that Qwen will serve as the default AI layer in Apple Intelligence for Chinese users across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and visionOS. This integration enables advanced text and image understanding and generation, all within Apple’s ecosystem, and ensures compliance with China’s local AI model requirements, replacing OpenAI’s ChatGPT used elsewhere. Following the announcement, Alibaba’s shares surged over 6%, reflecting market optimism about the company’s pivot toward AI infrastructure. Apple is also exploring deeper technical integration to further optimize Qwen for iPhone devices. This partnership marks a significant development amid growing US-China competition in artificial intelligence.