# Alibaba raises $10.2B and pledges RMB 380B to fuel AI and cloud buildout

> Alibaba has raised 10.2 billion dollars in Hong Kong's largest share placement and paired it with a pledge to spend 380 billion yuan over three years on AI and cloud infrastructure. The company says its AI revenue is on pace for a 10 billion dollar annual run rate by September, with triple-digit growth for the eighth quarter running. The fundraise is a statement of intent from China's cloud leader that it plans to compete at the frontier on its own terms. Cloud revenue grew 26 percent year over year, and Alibaba has kept shipping open-weight models, including its Qwen line, that developers worldwide can build on freely. Read alongside DeepSeek's latest, it sketches a Chinese AI sector that is both well funded and increasingly confident. Massive capital commitments to data centers and chips, plus a steady stream of capable open models, put Alibaba in a position to shape how AI develops across Asia and beyond, not just to follow the US labs.

_Section: [Daily AI Updates](https://www.wortins.com/daily-ai) · Source: South China Morning Post · Published Wednesday, August 26, 2026_

## Wortins' read

Alibaba has raised 10.2 billion dollars in Hong Kong's largest share placement and paired it with a pledge to spend 380 billion yuan over three years on AI and cloud infrastructure. The company says its AI revenue is on pace for a 10 billion dollar annual run rate by September, with triple-digit growth for the eighth quarter running. The fundraise is a statement of intent from China's cloud leader that it plans to compete at the frontier on its own terms. Cloud revenue grew 26 percent year over year, and Alibaba has kept shipping open-weight models, including its Qwen line, that developers worldwide can build on freely. Read alongside DeepSeek's latest, it sketches a Chinese AI sector that is both well funded and increasingly confident. Massive capital commitments to data centers and chips, plus a steady stream of capable open models, put Alibaba in a position to shape how AI develops across Asia and beyond, not just to follow the US labs.

## Source

[Read the full story at South China Morning Post](https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3354324/alibaba-signals-next-phase-ai-growth-investment-commercialisation)

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