Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba’s capex tripled year-on-year to $10 billion in 2024, with a planned investment in AI and cloud infrastructure over the next three years forecast to top what it allocated over the past decade.

On a fiscal Q3 2025 (the period to end-December 2024) earnings call last week, CEO Eddie Wu said AI technology advancements are driving profound industry transformation and the company would scale up investments as part of its broader strategy for the technology.

Goldman Sachs estimated the allocation could reach more than CNY360 billion ($49.8 billion) over the three years.

The company’s capex totalled CNY326.1 billion over the past ten fiscal years, peaking at CNY65.9 billion in the year to end-March 2022.

Wu noted the investment would focus on AI and cloud and computing; foundation models and native applications; and transforming its existing businesses using the technology.

The company added it also is committed to advancing multi-modal AI technology and expanding its open-source initiatives.

Wu said the company is “extremely well-positioned in the AI space” and is the leading cloud provider in the Asia market.

“We have leading models and leading technology.”

Wu said customer demand for Alibaba Cloud Group products had surged due to the rapid adoption of AI technology across industries.

“Looking ahead, revenue growth at Cloud Intelligence driven by AI will continue to accelerate.”

Cloud revenue in fiscal Q3 rose 13 per cent to CNY31.7 billion. The increase was driven by double-digit public cloud revenue gains aided by growing adoption of AI-related services, with sales maintaining a triple-digit growth for the sixth consecutive quarter.

Alibaba recently reached a deal with Apple to develop AI features for iPhones sold in China.