Yandex plans to release a major update for Alice AI in the coming weeks, according to Dmitry Masyuk, director of the company's search and AI business group. The daily audience of the application grew by 14% over the past month.
According to Mediascope, Alice AI reached 59 million users in September, accounting for 48% of the Russian population aged 12 and older. The total monthly reach of AI services in the country grew by more than double over the past year.
The announcement follows infrastructure recovery efforts after incidents at three Yandex data centers. Fires and technical failures occurred in Sasovo on October 8, Kaluga on October 9, and near Vladimir on October 11, leading to full or partial shutdowns.
The outages affected search, maps, taxi, mail, and payment services, as well as third-party companies relying on Yandex infrastructure. By October 14, functionality for Alice AI, smart speakers, and YaOS TVs was restored, followed by Direct and Yandex 360 services on October 20.
