Former Alibaba Tongyi Qianwen Head Lin Junyang Announces Startup, Secures Sequoia and Tencent as First-Round Investors Lin Junyang, the former head of Alibaba's Tongyi Qianwen, announced his new venture via a post, revealing the establishment of an AI lab called Pragmatik Labs in Shanghai. The lab will focus on developing next-generation AI agents that integrate the digital and physical worlds. Lin disclosed that the first round of funding was co-led by Gaorong Capital and Sequoia China (HSG), with Tencent and the Shanghai Future Industry Fund participating as follow-on investors. According to insiders, the total scale of this funding round reached several hundred million USD, with a post-money valuation of approximately $2 billion. Gaorong Capital and Sequoia China each contributed $100 million as co-leads, while Tencent invested $20 million. Lin Junyang previously served as the core technical lead for Alibaba's Tongyi Qianwen, spearheading the development of the Tongyi Qianwen model series, open-source ecosystem initiatives, and the release of the Qwen3-Max trillion-parameter flagship model. He announced his resignation on March 4 this year, and the following day, Alibaba CEO Wu Yongming announced via an internal email the formation of a foundational model support team.