Ex-Alibaba Cloud engineer: messy org and misplaced KPIs are holding Qwen back
teortaxesTex · x · 2026-11-11
A former Alibaba Cloud engineer published a candid postmortem on why Qwen underperforms despite ample GPUs and talent: leadership churn left executives without judgment in a fast-moving field, resources were never consolidated (unlike Google's DeepMind+Brain merger), Qwen simultaneously carries model R&D, consumer productization, and cloud-consumption KPIs, and teams are evaluated on cloud/token revenue before the model is even good. He also cites chaotic internal voice-model rivals and a bloated Bailian platform. Commentator teortaxesTex frames it as why legacy IT giants on both sides of the Pacific are losing the AGI race to startups.
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