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Wency Chen

Alibaba Group Holding and Honor are set to deepen their tie-up over an operating system for AI-powered devices, as competition in the nascent “AI phone” genre gains momentum in China.
The partnership is expected to be announced at the coming World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC), which kicks off on Friday in Shanghai, alongside demonstrations of new agent capabilities developed by both, according to people familiar with the matter.
Shenzhen-based Honor, spun off from Huawei Technologies in 2020, will host a sub-forum at WAIC on Saturday titled “From digital screens to embodied intelligence”, CEO Li Jian said in a post on social media platform Weibo on Tuesday.
High-profile speakers will include Xu Zhuhong, head of multimodal interaction at Alibaba’s Token Foundry unit; Kevin Kelly, founder of Wired; Xu Hao, head of research and development for Qualcomm China; and Liu Jingkang, founder of action-camera maker Insta360.
Alibaba Cloud responded with a post saying “define a new model of embodied interaction” through Honor’s Robot Phone. The device, which features a foldable robotic gimbal arm, was formally unveiled at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in March but has yet to enter mass production or go on sale.
Alibaba and Honor did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

Honor has been developing what it calls a “next-generation terminal operating system”, known as Agentic OS, whose full technical framework it previously said would be unveiled in July.
The system, based on what Honor said at the Mobile World Congress Shanghai in June, would be centred on user intent, support more natural forms of interaction and proactively plan and execute tasks across multiple devices.
The planned WAIC announcement is set to deepen ties between Alibaba and Honor, after they signed a strategic partnership in 2025 covering AI ecosystems, models and internet services.
The upcoming AI operating system comes as competition in the AI agent phone market has intensified in recent months.
On Monday, Shanghai-based AI start-up StepFun unveiled STEPX Neo, its first AI-native smartphone, alongside its Step AOS operating system.
Nubia, a smartphone brand owned by ZTE, plans to unveil what it calls the world’s first mass-produced flagship AI agent phone at WAIC.
The company last year worked with ByteDance on an experimental AI phone, which drew criticism from users and industry participants over handling of personal data, while several apps blocked it.
Alibaba has also been strengthening its technology offerings for AI devices. In June, it introduced Qwen3.7-Plus, a multimodal agent model that is capable of interpreting real-world scenes, reading screens and operating graphical interfaces.


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Artificial intelligence (AI)

Alibaba to team up with Honor in race to build AI agentic devices

The Honor booth at the Mobile World Congress in Shanghai, June 18, 2025. Photo: NurPhoto via Getty Images

An AI sign is seen at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai, July 6, 2023. Photo: Reuters

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TikTok owner ByteDance has teamed up with ZTE to put its agentic AI into smartphones. Photo: Shutterstock

ByteDance has embedded its Doubao AI agent in a ZTE-made Nubia prototype as agentic AI shapes up as the next battleground. Photo: Shutterstock

China’s Honor debuts robot phone and humanoid companion in push into AI hardware

Honor gives a preview of its robot phone, which features a fold-out gimbal-attached camera, ahead of MWC Barcelona. Photo: Handout

The camera arm and multimodal AI capabilities allow the robot phone to make all-angle video calls, according to Honor. Photo: Handout

Tech

News

China Future Tech

Huawei spin-off Honor has been developing what it calls a ‘next-generation terminal operating system’, known as Agentic OS


Huawei spin-off Honor has been developing what it calls a ‘next-generation terminal operating system’, known as Agentic OS.


Alibaba

Honor

Alibaba to team up with Honor in race to build AI agentic devices

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Huawei spin-off Honor has been developing what it calls a ‘next-generation terminal operating system’, known as Agentic OS

Huawei spin-off Honor has been developing what it calls a ‘next-generation terminal operating system’, known as Agentic OS