- More than 40,000 relatives and friends signed up to visit Alibaba campuses nationwide
- AI assistants, games and smart agents took center stage at this year’s event
Alibaba Group transformed its annual “Ali Day” celebration into a large-scale showcase for its latest AI products, opening 10 campuses across China to employees’ families and friends as the company pushes to bring AI deeper into daily life.
More than 40,000 guests registered for this year’s event on May 10, coinciding with Mother’s Day and the 22nd edition of Alibaba’s annual open-campus carnival.
At the company’s Hangzhou headquarters, visitors moved between themed attractions ranging from AI-powered assistants and immersive gaming booths to food fairs, health consultations and matchmaking corners.
A recurring theme this year was “AI” — pronounced the same as the Chinese word for “love.” Alibaba used the event to demonstrate how its AI ecosystem is shifting from experimental tools toward consumer-facing services designed for everyday use.
One of the most popular attractions was “Qwen Xiaojiuwo,” an AI assistant that acted as a real-time campus guide. Visitors could engage in conversations with the digital avatar, asking for directions, activity schedules or recommendations through voice interaction.
“Now it’s just a matter of speaking,” one attendee said while trying the assistant for the first time.
At Alibaba Cloud’s AI exhibition area, guests tested applications including AI drawing games and intelligent agent products such as Meoo, JVSClaw as well as the multimodal video generation tool HappyHorse and interactive world model HappyOyster.
Another unit Wukong, which focuses on business-oriented workplace collaboration, turned its enterprise AI workplace platform into interactive games showcasing what Alibaba described as “communication-as-execution” capabilities, including AI-powered transcription and task execution demos.
Ali Day traces its origins to the 2003 SARS outbreak, when Alibaba employees worked remotely and family members volunteered to help handle customer service calls for what was then a fledgling business-to-business marketplace connecting global buyers and Chinese suppliers.
The company formally established May 10 as “Ali Family Day” in 2005, opening offices worldwide each year to employees’ relatives and friends.
