Alibaba sends AI ‘digital employees’ to work in rival apps from ByteDance, Tencent

Alibaba Group Holding has introduced a new AI tool that allows users to generate "digital employees" that can work within competing business communication platforms from rivals ByteDance and Tencent Holdings. The QoderWake tool, launched by Alibaba Cloud on Tuesday, enables users to describe a job role in a single line, after which the AI generates a fully functional digital worker capable of operating seamlessly within Alibaba's DingTalk, ByteDance's Feishu, and Tencent's WeCom platforms.

These digital employees can autonomously absorb context from shared documents, calendars, and group chats, and have been fine-tuned using data from top industry teams to handle real-world tasks without further training. The tool currently offers 10 pre-built roles, including product manager, data analyst, and various developer positions, reflecting the trend of Chinese tech giants leveraging AI to expand into lucrative business applications.

Since its April release, QoderWake has deployed nearly 100,000 digital employees to perform around 2 million tasks in real-world enterprise scenarios over the past three months. This move comes as China's office AI agent sector saw significant growth in early 2026, with domestic companies releasing over 20 competing products within six months following the success of overseas agents like Claude Cowork.

Other Chinese tech giants, including Tencent and ByteDance, have also accelerated their enterprise AI efforts, launching platforms like Tencent's WorkBuddy and ByteDance's Doubao Work. Alibaba's enhancements to QoderWake follow the international rollout of QwenWork, an all-in-one AI productivity platform targeting fast-growing markets in Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America.