Alibaba's research arm shuts quantum computing lab amid restructuring

Shanghai: Chinese tech giant Alibaba has cut a quantum computing laboratory and team from its research arm, donating both the lab and related experimental equipment to Zhejiang University, the company said on Monday.

A spokesperson for Alibaba's DAMO Academy, Alibaba's in-house research initiative which included the lab, said the academy would continue to focus on technology research with the aim of being a leader in artificial intelligence (AI) research.

Earlier, a person with knowledge of the matter had told Reuters that the lab, and its 30 employees, represents a small part of Alibaba's overall RD team.

The source said Zhejiang University would try and recruit the affected employees to work on its own quantum research.

DAMO Academy was launched in 2017 by Alibaba Group to research advanced technologies such as AI and machine learning.

The closure of the lab is the latest internal change at Alibaba, which said in March it would split its business into six units and spin-off its cloud division.

That spin-off was scrapped this month, and new CEO Eddie Wu said each of Alibaba's businesses would face the market more independently and that they would conduct a strategic reviews to distinguish between "core" and "non-core" businesses.