Alibaba Adds Smart Assistant and Upgraded Image Search to B2B Platform

Alibaba.com has added enhancements to its global B2B eCommerce platform to help small business owners level up their sourcing and supply chain operations.

“We are making the sourcing journey more intuitive and visualizable by helping enterprises of all sizes better utilize today’s leading eCommerce technologies,” Stephen Kuo, president of Alibaba.com North America, said in a Thursday (Sept. 7) press release announcing the new enhancements.

The suite of new features, products and upgrades includes a smart assistant tool that helps users track orders and discover new opportunities, an upgraded image search that lets users search for products using both images and text at the same time, and predictive sentence completion and image generation that facilitates the request for quotation (RFQ) process, according to the release.

The new additions to the suite also include real-time translation in 17 languages for live video chats with suppliers, and an Alibaba.com Logistics Marketplace that offers live customer service around the clock and enables tracking of B2B shipments, the release said.

With these new offerings, Alibaba.com aims to address the needs of small business owners, per the release. The platform is working to mitigate risks and provide solutions for business owners by offering tools for optimizing the supply chain, streamlined payment options, logistics offerings and improved communication with suppliers.

“At Alibaba.com, we are not just a link in the supply chain — we are dreamers and creators as well,” Kuo said in the release. “We’re reinventing ourselves to become a link in the ‘creation chain’ for entrepreneurs.”

PYMNTS Intelligence has found that buyers will always want to be able to find supply more efficiently.

Many of the emergent B2B marketplaces jostling for position come with bells and whistles that reduce administrative burdens and remove manual processes by combining various technologies to increase speed, efficiency and operational visibility. They also include features that build greater trust between business partners.

For example, legacy B2B payment systems are rapidly giving way to digital platforms that can accelerate transactions, improve cash flow and streamline compliance, according to “Merchants Need Modern Payment Systems to Meet Customer Demand,” a PYMNTS and American Express collaboration.