LONDON: Global giant, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. has begun sales of its first smart glasses powered by its Qwen AI models, marking a rare foray into consumer hardware or accessories.
The new Quark S1 glasses include built-in translucent displays that superimpose contextual information on the user’s view of surroundings. Equipped with cameras, bone conduction microphones and swappable batteries rated to last 24 hours, this new product aims to offer the Chinese market something along the lines of Meta Platforms Inc.’s Ray-Ban smart glasses.
It marks an extension of Alibaba’s ambitious reorganisation into an AI-first business. The company made a big splash with its Qwen app release last week, consolidating its various consumer AI services into a single, upgraded program that quickly attracted more than 10 million users.
Chief executive officer Eddie Wu this week said the company has seen “exceptional user retention” with the new release. Alibaba has also integrated the Qwen suite into its Quark desktop browser and is now broadening its reach with the Quark wearables lineup.
Alongside the S1, which starts at 3,799 yuan ($537), Alibaba will offer a 1,899-yuan Quark G1 model that eschews the micro-OLED displays. The S1 is available to buy immediately from Alibaba’s Tmall, JD.com, ByteDance Ltd.’s Douyin and more than 600 stores across 82 cities in China. International versions will come next year, with some available via platforms like AliExpress, according to a spokesperson from Alibaba’s Quark unit. It is unsure if these will be retailed in international markets. The company is yet to issue a clarification for now.
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