Day: December 9, 2025

China has activated what may be the world’s largest distributed AI computing pool alongside a high-speed data network that has been planned for more than a decade, according to an official state newspaper. It said this optical network linked computing centres separated by distance so they could work together almost as efficiently as a single giant computer. The computational efficiency of a 2,000km (1,243-mile) wide computing power pool formed via this network could reach 98 per cent of that of a single data centre, said Liu Yunjie, a member of…

A new report recommends European companies diversify away from overreliance on China and the US, as companies find themselves squeezed between Beijing’s preferential policies for local companies and Washington’s trade volatility. The European Union Chamber of Commerce in China advised companies to “eliminate single-source dependencies on both China and the United States where possible” in a report on supply chain dependencies released on Wednesday. “We are probably only seeing the very tip of the iceberg when it comes to understanding dependencies,” the chamber’s president, Jens Eskelund, said at an earlier…

The new business unit, Qwen Consumer Business Group, led by Alibaba vice-president Wu Jia, will oversee the Qwen chatbot app, the Quark AI assistant and cloud drive, AI hardware products, the UC Browser and the online reading platform Shuqi. The move marked a significant organisational change at Alibaba to promote the consumer use of its AI offerings after it secured a dominant position in open-source models for developers. The division’s top priority is to turn the Qwen chatbot into an accessible “super app” for use in scenarios including glasses, personal…

Deep Robotics – one of the “Six Little Dragons” from Hangzhou, the capital of eastern Zhejiang province – on Tuesday said it had raised 500 million yuan (US$70 million) in fresh funding from a group of Chinese investors. According to the company’s statement, its latest round of financing was led by CMB International, China Asset Management and funds under state-owned telecommunications network operators China Telecom and China Unicom. Deep Robotics founder and CEO Zhu Qiuguo, who also serves as an associate professor and PhD adviser at Zhejiang University, said the…

China and Hong Kong stocks could deliver nearly 20 per cent gains in 2026, supported by resilient global growth, improving earnings and easing competition among e-commerce giants, according to JPMorgan. The bank expected the MSCI China Index to rebound further as valuations normalised and Beijing’s push to curb excess capacity boosted profitability across key sectors, said Wendy Liu, chief China equity strategist at JPMorgan. “Earnings are giving us confidence,” Liu said during a media briefing on Tuesday. She added that China’s markets were moving through a period of earnings recovery…

When a European start-up developed a breakthrough technology capable of transforming low-grade bauxite – once considered waste – into high-quality feedstock for aluminium production, they announced it at an industry conference in Miami, United States. The innovation not only promises to revive exhausted mines, but also opens a new door to extracting critical minerals and rare earth elements essential for semiconductors, electric vehicles and national defence. With Western governments from Washington to Brussels sounding the alarm over fragile supply chains and overdependence on China, one might have expected this European…