Alibaba bets $290 million on ShengShu's world model AI to move beyond text-based chatbots

Alibaba Leads $300 Million Bet on AI Video Generator ShengShu

ShengShu intends to use the new funds to advance its development of a general world model, according to the statement. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.'s cloud division led a 2 billion yuan ($293 million) funding round for ShengShu Technology, bolstering the war chest of a young contender in China's crowded AI video contest. The Beijing-based startup also drew backing from Baidu Ventures and Luminous Ventures, it said in a statement without disclosing its valuation. The capital injection comes just two months after the maker of the Vidu video generator raisedBloomberg Terminal 600 million yuan. Vidu is in a capital-intensive race to develop video generation tools that's pulled in tech heavyweights like ByteDance Ltd., Alibaba and Kuaishou Technology, as well as upstarts like PixVerse, which is also backed by Alibaba. They aim to fill the gap left after OpenAI shuttered its Sora project to focus on core GPT models. Earlier in the week, the release of a new video generator dubbed Happy Horse -- whose developer has not yet been revealed -- triggered an investment flurryBloomberg Terminal in Chinese AI stocks after speculation that its author was a local company. The new AI tool outperformed ByteDance's Seedance 2 as the best text-to-video service on the Artificial Analysis chart. Vidu ranks ninth on that list. Alibaba, for its part, is one of the most active backers of Chinese artificial intelligence startups, hoping the financing will drive usage of its cloud computing platform, which has overtaken e-commerce as its fastest-growing moneymaker. Founded in March 2023, ShengShu was started by Tsinghua University professor Zhu Jun, who serves as its chief scientist. Its early backers include Qiming Venture Partners, Baidu Inc. and a Beijing government fund. In 2025, the company reported more than tenfold growth in both users and revenue, without disclosing specific figures. Vidu has reached users in over 200 countries and regions worldwide, spanning industries such as animation, advertising and film. In December, ShengShu open-sourced Motus -- a new AI model line that enables robots and other machine-intelligence systems to better perceive and understand real‑world environments. The company intends to use the new funds to advance its development of a general world model, according to the statement.

Chinese startup ShengShu raises $293 million to advance artificial general intelligence

BEIJING/SINGAPORE, April 10 (Reuters) - Chinese artificial intelligence startup ShengShu Technology has raised 2 billion yuan ($292.59 million) in a funding round led by Alibaba Cloud, the company said on Friday, as competition intensifies in China's AI sector. ShengShu said the funding would support development of a "general world model" that processes sensory information to simulate human perception and interaction, which the company describes as a step toward artificial general intelligence in physical environments. The company did not provide a timeline for when ⁠such a system would be commercially available. Chinese companies ranging from industry giants like ByteDance to startups such as humanoid robot specialist Unitree have begun exploring similar "world model" technologies. ShengShu said the funding round included investments from Andon Haitang, China Internet Investment Fund, TAL Education Group, and Luminous Ventures. Existing investors LINK-X CAPITAL, Delta Capital, and Baidu Ventures also increased their stakes. Founded in early 2023 by Tsinghua University alum Zhu Jun, ShengShu became the first Chinese ⁠company to release a video generation model when it launched Vidu in April 2024. The model was positioned as a competitor to OpenAI's Sora, which the U.S. company later discontinued. ShengShu has since released several updated versions of Vidu, including the ⁠Vidu Q3 model announced earlier this year. The company has also recently expanded into robotics applications. In December 2025, it open-sourced Motus, a model designed to control robots ⁠by processing multimodal data including video and audio. The startup faces competition from Chinese technology giants including ByteDance, Alibaba (9988.HK), opens new tab and Kuaishou (1024.HK), opens new tab, which have all launched ⁠video generation models. Internationally, companies such as Google and startups including Runway are also developing similar technologies. ($1 = 6.8355 Chinese yuan renminbi) Reporting by Liam Mo in Beijing and Miyoung Kim in Singapore; Editing by Jamie Freed Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Alibaba leads $290 million investment for building a new kind of AI model as LLM limits emerge

BEIJING -- Alibaba Cloud is investing in a new type of artificial intelligence designed to better replicate the real world using a different approach from chatbots such as OpenAI's ChatGPT. The shift recognizes the limits of "large language models" trained primarily on text. Instead, developers are starting to focus more on "world models" built on videos and real-life physical scenarios. To jump on the trend, Alibaba led a 2 billion yuan ($290 million) investment in ShengShu, the startup behind the AI video generation tool Vidu, the company announced Friday. TAL Education and Baidu Ventures also participated in the series B funding round. The investment comes about two months after ShengShu raised 600 million yuan from Qiming Venture Partners and other backers. The startup declined to disclose its valuation. ShengShu said the latest funding will support building a "general world model" that can use AI to bridge two currently separate domains: the digital world of games and AI-generated video, and the physical world of autonomous driving and robots. "ShengShu believes that a general world model, built on multimodal data such as vision, audio, and touch, more naturally captures how the physical world works than large language models," the three-year-old startup said in a statement.

Chinese startup ShengShu raises $293 million to advance artificial general intelligence

Founded in early 2023 by Tsinghua University alum Zhu Jun, ShengShu became the first Chinese company to release a video generation model when it launched Vidu in April 2024. The model was positioned as a competitor to OpenAI's Sora, which the US company later discontinued. Chinese artificial intelligence startup ShengShu Technology has raised 2 billion yuan ($292.59 million) in a funding round led by Alibaba Cloud, the company said on Friday, as competition intensifies in China's AI sector. ShengShu said the funding would support development of a "general world model" that processes sensory information to ⁠simulate human ⁠perception and interaction, which the company describes as a step toward artificial general intelligence in physical environments. The company did not provide a timeline for when such a system would be commercially available. Chinese companies ranging from industry giants like ByteDance to startups such as humanoid robot specialist Unitree have begun exploring similar "world model" technologies. ShengShu ⁠said the funding round included investments from Andon Haitang, China Internet Investment Fund, TAL Education Group, and Luminous Ventures. ⁠Existing investors LINK-X CAPITAL, Delta Capital, and Baidu Ventures also increased their stakes. Founded in early 2023 by Tsinghua University alum Zhu Jun, ShengShu became the first Chinese company to release a video generation model when it launched Vidu in April 2024. The model was positioned as a competitor to OpenAI's Sora, which the U.S. company later discontinued. ShengShu has since released several updated versions of Vidu, including the Vidu Q3 model announced earlier this year. The company has also recently expanded into robotics ⁠applications. In December 2025, it open-sourced Motus, a model designed to control robots by processing multimodal data including video and audio. The startup faces competition from Chinese technology giants including ByteDance, Alibaba and Kuaishou, which have all launched video generation models. Internationally, companies such as Google and startups including Runway are also developing similar technologies. ($1 = 6.8355 Chinese yuan renminbi)

Alibaba Bets $290M on Next-Gen AI; Aims to Take Over ChatGPT-Style Models

Alibaba leads a $290 million investment in Chinese startup ShengShu, marking a major shift in the artificial intelligence race. The shift highlights the limits of 'large language models' trained primarily on text. Instead, developers are starting to focus more on 'world models' built on videos and real-life physical scenarios. ShengShu said the latest funding will support the development of a "general world model that uses AI to bridge two currently separate domains: the digital world of games and AI-generated video and the physical world of autonomous driving and robots." Zhu Jun, of ShengShu, added in a statement, "ShengShu believes that a general world model, built on multimodal data such as vision, audio, and touch, more naturally captures how the physical world works than large language models." He also believes that AI systems trained on world models can more consistently predict real-world behavior.

Chinese startup ShengShu raises $293 million to advance artificial general intelligence

BEIJING/SINGAPORE, April 10 (Reuters) - Chinese artificial intelligence startup ShengShu Technology has raised 2 billion yuan ($292.59 million) in a funding round led by Alibaba Cloud, the company said on Friday, as competition intensifies in China's AI sector. ShengShu said the funding would support development of a "general world model" that processes sensory information to simulate human perception and interaction, which the company describes as a step toward artificial general intelligence in physical environments. The company did not provide a timeline for when such a system would be commercially available. Chinese companies ranging from industry giants like ByteDance to startups such as humanoid robot specialist Unitree have begun exploring similar "world model" technologies. ShengShu said the funding round included investments from Andon Haitang, China Internet Investment Fund, TAL Education Group, and Luminous Ventures. Existing investors LINK-X CAPITAL, Delta Capital, and Baidu Ventures also increased their stakes. Founded in early 2023 by Tsinghua University alum Zhu Jun, ShengShu became the first Chinese company to release a video generation model when it launched Vidu in April 2024. The model was positioned as a competitor to OpenAI's Sora, which the U.S. company later discontinued. ShengShu has since released several updated versions of Vidu, including the Vidu Q3 model announced earlier this year. The company has also recently expanded into robotics applications. In December 2025, it open-sourced Motus, a model designed to control robots by processing multimodal data including video and audio. The startup faces competition from Chinese technology giants including ByteDance, Alibaba and Kuaishou, which have all launched video generation models. Internationally, companies such as Google and startups including Runway are also developing similar technologies. (Reporting by Liam Mo in Beijing and Miyoung Kim in Singapore; Editing by Jamie Freed)