Alibaba2026-09-30 07:20:14Alibaba and OSChina build domestic AI model hubs as China blocks Hugging FaceAlibaba launched the open-source model platform ModelScope in 2022, while OSChina rolled out MoArk in 2023 to offer model hosting, testing, and customization for Chinese developers inside the firewall, according to Rest of World. The report said Chinese regulators blocked Hugging Face in 2023 without giving a public reason, while at the same time allowing some AI labs to work around the restriction so Chinese models could still be shared globally. ModelScope now hosts more than 170,000 models and said in March that it had 170,000 models and 250 million users. MoArk hosts about 20,000 commonly used models. Both remain far smaller than Hugging Face, which hosts more than 3 million open models. OSChina CEO Xu Yong said China needs its own AI ecosystem for Chinese-speaking users and said MoArk has engineering teams working to make models run on different types of Chinese chips. The report also noted that Nvidia announced a $12.9 billion acquisition of Hugging Face in September and said in regulatory filings that regulators may ban the sharing of Chinese models on the site.420
Alibaba2026-08-26 08:05:56Alibaba open-sources Qwen3.8-Flash-Next as an early look at the Qwen 4 architectureAlibaba’s Qwen team has released Qwen3.8-Flash-Next on August 26, presenting it as a preview of the Qwen 4 architecture before the full Qwen 4 family arrives. According to the model page on Hugging Face, the release gives developers an early chance to test and prepare for the next-generation architecture rather than wait for the formal rollout. The model is described as an open-source multimodal system built on a mixture-of-experts, or MoE, design. Alibaba said it has about 125 billion total parameters, while activating roughly 6 billion parameters per token. The stated goal is to keep the knowledge scale of a large model while lowering inference costs in practice. Model weights are already available on Hugging Face, and Alibaba said the model is also planned for China’s ModelScope platform. That means developers can access it without relying on a proprietary API. At the same time, Alibaba has not released benchmark results for Qwen3.8-Flash-Next, and the published parameter specifications have not yet been independently verified. Full performance still awaits broader evaluation.1010
Alibaba2026-08-25 21:20:40Alibaba’s Qwen team says Qwen 3.8-Flash-Next will launch on WednesdayAlibaba’s Qwen team is set to release Qwen 3.8-Flash-Next on Wednesday, according to ChainCatcher. The model is described as a mixture-of-experts, or MoE, system with 125 billion total parameters and 6 billion parameters activated per token, though the report noted those figures have not yet been officially confirmed. The team is positioning the release as a preview of the next-generation Qwen 4 architecture rather than its final flagship model. The model is also described as multimodal and built on the upcoming Qwen 4 framework. Qwen said it is releasing this early version ahead of the broader Qwen lineup so developers can start preparing for the full series. Model weights will be hosted on Hugging Face and ModelScope. The report added that Qwen has not yet published benchmark results or comparison data against its own Qwen 3 series or overseas rivals. As an open-weight model, Qwen 3.8-Flash-Next will allow developers to download, fine-tune, and run it without sending data to a closed API, a setup the report said can help reduce hosted model costs.930
