Alibaba deepens ecosystem push with Qwen-Amap tie-up for routes, restaurants and hotels

Alibaba Group Holding is folding its mapping and navigation platform Amap into its Qwen artificial intelligence app, in a tie-up the company says will sharpen Qwen’s real-world “life services” just weeks after the app’s debut.

The integration, announced on Thursday, lets Qwen users handle travel and lifestyle requests – from restaurant and hotel recommendations to route planning and turn-by-turn navigation – in a single conversational interface. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

Alibaba said Qwen could now build end-to-end itineraries using Amap’s database of real-time traffic information and more than 200 million points of interest, removing the need to switch between apps.

The move was expected to bolster Qwen’s service capabilities after its November launch, which made it the world’s fastest-growing AI app, according to third-party data.

Data from AI product tracker Aicpb.com showed Qwen’s monthly active users rose 149 per cent over the month to 18.34 million, ranking it the world’s 24th most used AI app just two weeks into its public beta.

Alibaba described the Amap tie-up as “another milestone” in Qwen’s evolution into a day-to-day “life and work partner”. The move also reflected its broader push this year to reconnect services and draw more synergy from its sprawling ecosystem.