Alibaba Unveils Self-Developed Semiconductor Chip

'ETN710' Chip Cloud Server Test During Guanggun Festival
Beneficial Year for China's Semiconductor Industry in 2023

[Asia Economy Beijing=Special Correspondent Jo Young-shin] Alibaba Group, China's largest e-commerce company, has unveiled a self-developed semiconductor chip. It is also reported that Alibaba Group has applied to participate as a strategic investor in Tsinghua Unigroup, which is undergoing restructuring, indicating moves to acquire Tsinghua Uni even before the acquisition process.

Photo by Global Times capture

China's state-run Global Times reported on the 20th that Alibaba showcased its self-designed semiconductor chip, the "Yitian 710." The chip development aims to strengthen cloud computing and is described by the media as a measure to compete with American companies such as Amazon.

The Global Times cited a representative from Alibaba's research and development (R&D) team, stating that the newly developed semiconductor chip will be applied only to Alibaba's own servers and will be tested on multiple cloud servers during the Singles' Day shopping festival on November 11.

The chip unveiled by Alibaba is based on the architecture of the British semiconductor design company ARM, and Alibaba did not participate in the chip manufacturing and production, the media explained. Alibaba did not disclose the chip manufacturer.

Jeff Zhang, CEO of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence, said, "We will continue close cooperation with partners such as Intel, Nvidia, AMD, and ARM to provide customers with more choices."

The Global Times explained the background of the development, stating that Alibaba's self-developed semiconductor chip emerged amid U.S. pressure on China's advanced industrial sectors, and Alibaba is accumulating experience by focusing resources on chip design.

Sing Li-gang, Secretary-General of the China Information Consumption Federation, said, "Although progress in chip production and manufacturing sectors is difficult, there will be significant advances in chip design," adding, "The year 2023 will be a beneficial year for China's semiconductor chip industry."

Alibaba previously introduced the AI semiconductor chip "Hanguang 800" and the central processing unit (CPU) "XuanTie 910" in 2019.