Alibaba’s upgraded AI assistant, Quark, launched on Mar. 13, is being hailed as the company’s “killer app” in the competitive AI agent market.

Powered by the Qwen reasoning AI model, Quark has evolved from a simple search and cloud storage tool into an advanced assistant that adapts to user intent automatically.

The AI assistant has drawn positive reviews in China, with Sohu founder Charles Zhao Chaoyang praising its efficiency, particularly in answering cosmology questions using its deep-thinking mode.

As the AI agent race heats up, Quark positions Alibaba against major rivals like Butterfly Effect’s Manus and OpenAI’s Deep Research, both designed to perform autonomous tasks for users.

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