Alibaba’s Qwen AI project has undergone a significant change in leadership, as Junyang Lin, a key technical leader, announced his departure shortly after the launch of the new Qwen 3.5 open-weight small models. Lin, who joined Alibaba in 2019 and moved to the Qwen team in 2023, revealed his decision without providing specific details. This move has sparked reactions within the industry, coinciding with the escalating global competition in AI development.
The Qwen family of models, a prominent open-weight AI initiative in China, has been gaining recognition for its performance comparable to leading U.S. systems. The recent introduction of the Qwen 3.5 Small Model series, featuring models with varying parameters designed for diverse AI applications, has garnered attention from industry experts.
Lin’s exit, occurring amidst ongoing releases from the Qwen team, has been described by colleagues and partners as a pivotal moment for the project. Wenting Zhao, a research scientist on the team, acknowledged Lin’s contribution to the project’s advancements in open-source AI and engineering. Yuchen Jin, the CTO of AI infrastructure startup Hyperbolic, highlighted Lin’s role in fostering connections with the global developer community.
Source: TechCrunch