Baidu to finish testing ChatGPT-style project ‘Ernie Bot’ in March; shares rally

BEIJING, Feb 7 (Reuters) – China’s Baidu Inc (9888.HK) mentioned on Tuesday it will full inner testing of a ChatGPT-style mission known as “Ernie Bot” in March, as curiosity in generative synthetic intelligence (AI) gathers steam.

The search engine big’s Hong Kong-listed shares closed up 15.3% on Tuesday, whereas its U.S shares climbed 11.2% in morning commerce.

A flurry of Chinese AI stocks additionally rallied, as the worldwide frenzy across the Microsoft-backed (MSFT.O) chatbot sensation ChatGPT spurred speculative bets on the brand new expertise.

Simply two months after its launch, ChatGPT – which might generate articles, essays, jokes and even poetry in response to prompts – has been rated the fastest-growing shopper app in historical past.

It has prompted many tech corporations to double down on the closely hyped generative AI expertise, which till not too long ago existed extra within the background than as a stable contributor to the underside line.

Google proprietor Alphabet Inc (GOOGL.O) mentioned on Monday it will launch a chatbot service and extra AI for its search engine, whereas Microsoft plans its personal AI reveal on Tuesday, underscoring rising rivalry to guide a brand new wave of computing.

Baidu, China’s reply to Google, joined the frenzy on Tuesday.

It mentioned Ernie，or “Enhanced Illustration by means of Information Integration,” is a big AI-powered language mannequin launched in 2019, and has regularly grown to have the ability to carry out duties together with language understanding, language era, and text-to-image era.

An individual accustomed to the matter told Reuters final week that Baidu was planning to launch such a service in March.

The particular person mentioned Baidu goals to make the service accessible as a standalone utility and regularly merge it into its search engine by incorporating chatbot-generated outcomes when customers make search requests.

ChatGPT and key Google companies will not be accessible in China, though some customers have discovered workarounds to entry such instruments.

Beijing-based Baidu has been a primary mover in China on different tech tendencies.

In late 2021, when the metaverse grew to become a brand new buzzword, the corporate launched “XiRang” which it described as China’s first metaverse platform.

The platform nevertheless was broadly panned for not providing a high-level, immersive expertise and Baidu mentioned it was a piece in progress.

The corporate has been investing closely in AI expertise, together with in cloud companies, chips and autonomous driving, because it seems to be to diversify its income sources.

Reporting by Yingzhi Yang and Brenda Goh; modifying by Christian Schmollinger and Jason Neely

Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.