China's Alibaba unveils AI image generator to take on Midjourney and DALL-E

By Josh Ye

HONG KONG, July 7 (Reuters) - Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd (9988.HK) announced on Friday an artificial intelligence (AI) image generator, initially available to enterprise customers in beta form, as it ramps up its offerings in the fast-growing AI sector.

The image generator, Tongyi Wanxiang, will compete with OpenAI’s DALL-E and Midjourney Inc’s Midjourney, U.S.-based rivals that have gained a large following worldwide.

Alibaba Cloud, recently formed from a massive overhaul that split the Chinese tech major into six units, has also released a ChatGPT-like text generator, Tongyi Qianwen, which was launched in April.

Several large Chinese tech companies are moving aggressively to roll out AI products and services following the success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot. McKinsey estimates that generative AI could eventually add $7.3 trillion in value to the world economy each year.

Baidu Inc (9888.HK) and SenseTime Group Inc <0020.HK

• also recently unveiled AI image generators, although generative AI services have yet to receive regulatory approval for wide distribution in China.

Alibaba Cloud has also rolled out ModelScopeGPT, an AI tool for developers.

The Tongyi Wanxiang image generator, which roughly translates as “truth from tens of thousands of pictures”, was revealed at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai on Friday.