Tech heavyweight bets on fast-evolving sector to transform its biz landscape

Chinese tech heavyweight Alibaba Group Holding Ltd is intensifying efforts to nurture and attract talent engaged in the artificial intelligence sector and stabilize employment, as the company is betting big on the fast-evolving sector to bring about transformative changes to its business landscape.

The company has kicked off its spring recruitment program, offering more than 3,000 internship openings for fresh graduates, with nearly half of these positions centered on AI. Some business departments reported even higher percentages of AI-related roles.

For instance, more than 80 percent of positions offered by Alibaba Cloud, Alibaba's cloud computing arm, are AI-focused. The AI-related positions from Amap, the mapping and local services business under Alibaba, account for about 65 percent of its total.

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The recruitment plan targets students graduating between November 2025 and October 2026, with internships spanning multiple business units including research and development, algorithms, technology, security and planning, Alibaba said.

"As a technology company committed to exploration and innovation, Alibaba is ramping up efforts to attract and cultivate AI talent," said Jiang Fang, chief people officer of Alibaba. "We hope to provide outstanding young professionals with broad development space to jointly embrace the immense opportunities in the AI era."

The first phase of the internships will focus on Alibaba Group, Alibaba Cloud, Amap, and Alibaba's AI model research unit Tongyi Lab, its food delivery service arm Ele.me and video games subsidiary Lingxi Games. The move comes amid increasing demand for AI adoption across a wide range of industries.

The next stage of the AI talent internship program will cover e-commerce unit Taobao and Tmall Group, Alibaba International Digital Commerce Group, logistics service unit Cainiao and other business divisions, Alibaba said.

During this spring recruitment period, Alibaba Cloud, in collaboration with the Tongyi Lab, will continue to advance the global talent recruitment initiative, namely the AI Clouder Program.

This project aims to attract outstanding talent passionate about exploring new technologies, and dedicated to bolstering technological innovation, as well as the development and application of top-tier technologies. It focuses on LLMs, multimodal understanding and generation, model applications, and AI infrastructure.

Notably, fresh graduates will have the opportunity to participate in the cutting-edge R&D of large language models, jointly promoting advancements in artificial general intelligence, or AGI.

Moreover, Alibaba and Shanghai Jiao Tong University have continuously carried out multilevel cooperation in areas such as scientific research, co-construction of courses, and co-cultivation of talent since 2017.

Experts said the recruitment initiative represents Alibaba's reinforcement of its talent pool and its intensified efforts to cultivate and discover AI talent.

The Hangzhou-based company has been doubling down on AI investments. Alibaba recently said it would invest more than 380 billion yuan ($52.8 billion) in building cloud computing and AI infrastructure over the next three years.

The investment surpasses the company's total AI infrastructure spending over the past decade, underscoring its focus on an AI-driven growth strategy. With this investment, Alibaba is scaling up its AI capabilities and cloud infrastructure to support the next wave of technological advancements.

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"We take AI as a once-in-a-generation industry transformation opportunity. Our primary goal is to achieve artificial general intelligence, continuously pushing the boundaries of model intelligence," said Wu Yongming, CEO of Alibaba Group, and chairman and CEO of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence Group.

Wu noted that AI's ability to replicate human intellectual and physical labor could fundamentally reshape global industries, driving significant economic and technological shifts.

"Chinese leading tech companies have played a vital role in expanding employment and bolstering technological innovation, especially in AI, which will be conducive to enhancing production efficiency and bolstering industrial upgrading, thus driving economic growth," said Jiang Han, a senior analyst at market consultancy Pangoal.

As new business models and evolving consumption patterns have popped up, new types of occupations related to AI have kept emerging in China and have become key sources of job creation, Jiang said, adding that these companies should seize the opportunities presented by a new round of scientific and technological revolution and strengthen talent cultivation and introduction.

Contact the writer at fanfeifei@chinadaily.com.cn