Alibaba’s annual gathering in 2017 was really special, because the Chinese Internet giant celebrated its “coming of age”. Thus far, they have accumulated 18 years of wisdom in the area of Internet technologies. The occasion was celebrated in Hangzhou at the Huanglong Sports Center with an unforgettable light show. The 40,000-strong audience was given IoT bracelets which were based on Espressif’s ESP32 chips. Alibaba’s own research and development department took advantage of ESP32’s versatility and reliability, thus creating a highly effective IoT gadget that, on the one hand, achieves real-time remote control with the highest precision while, on the other hand, creates unforgettable light effects.  

Light Effect Created by the ESP32-Embedded Wrist Bands

The celebration was attended by 40,000 employees from across the Alibaba Group, and every employee received an IoT bracelet before entering the Huanglong Sports Center. Each bracelet was actually a “pixel" which could receive a specific command signal that controlled the LED lights on the bracelet. When all the members of the audience were gathered together they formed a unique 30,000 m2 “live and wireless screen”. The flickering lights and changing colors of the IoT bracelets were automatically coordinated with the music, thus creating a feast for the eye and the ear. The first time we saw a spectacle like this was in the London Olympics in 2012, However, the manager of Alibaba’s IoT-bracelet project, Mr Han Kang, said that ‘compared to the London Olympic Games, Alibaba’s project was more efficient, convenient and cost-effective.

Alibaba’s 2017 Annual Gathering

This is not the first time that the Alibaba Group collaborates with Espressif. In the fourth edition of our newsletter last June we presented M1, the new biometric attendance-tracking system by Alibaba’s DingTalk. Besides this, Espressif products, such as ESP8266, ESP-WROOM-02, ESP32, and ESP-WROOM-32 have been granted an official certification by Alibaba’s IoT platform, Aliplus.