Two new EU countries are entering the plans of a Chinese cloud. That is the news for Europe from Apsara, not the trillions of parameters.
Germany and France are already on their map, and there Alibaba is only expanding its data centres. For a European company using Qwen through Alibaba's cloud, more regions in the EU mean more choice about where the data sits and an easier conversation with the lawyers.
Fact
The facts: at the Apsara 2026 conference, in a post dated 24 September 2026, Alibaba announced that its next-generation Qwen 4 models are in training, and that the Qwen 4.5 and Qwen 5 series are projected to reach 5 to 10 trillion parameters. Alibaba Cloud plans its first cloud regions in Türkiye, Finland and the Netherlands over the next 12 months, expansion in Malaysia, Germany, the UAE, France and Hong Kong, and more than 20 gigawatts of global data centre capacity by 2032; it currently operates 107 availability zones in 31 regions. Per the company, Qwen3.8-Max went through 33 cycles of fully automated self-improvement in one month and raised its Artificial Analysis score from 40 to 45. The chip unit T-Head unveiled the Zhenwu V900 processor with 216 GB of memory, scheduled for mass production in the first quarter of 2027. Alibaba also showed hardware: the Qwen Book computer, the Qwen Glasses N1 and N1 Pro, and the Qwen Clip earbuds, developed with Bose; pre-orders for the glasses and earbuds in China opened on 22 September, with sales scheduled for 13 October.
The number I would not stand on
Thirty-three cycles of self-improvement and five points up in a month. It sounds like exactly what Altman warned the Security Council about a day earlier.
But it is given in a single sentence, with no method, no word on what exactly improved or who checked. The Artificial Analysis score is external, but the road to it is described only by Alibaba. Until there is a report, this is an advert with a science word in it.
Self-improvement without a method is a promise, not a result.
The European regions can be checked: in a year they will either be in their console or not. That is the date worth writing down.
Official primary sources
Alizila (Alibaba Group) - Alibaba Cloud's 2026 Apsara Conference: Full-Stack AI Roadmap Along with Global Market Expansion Plan, 24.09.2026Alizila (Alibaba Group) - Alibaba Unveils Agentic Computer, AI Wearables and More at 2026 Apsara Conference, 24.09.2026The visual is generated code-art, no third-party images.