China’s Baidu (9888.HK) announced on Sunday the launch of two new artificial intelligence models, intensifying the competition in the rapidly evolving AI landscape. The move is a direct response to the emergence of DeepSeek, a Chinese AI startup whose models are reportedly challenging industry leaders.
Baidu’s new models include a reasoning-focused AI, which the company claims rivals the capabilities of DeepSeek’s model. DeepSeek’s recent advancements have disrupted the industry, particularly due to its cost-effectiveness, with some models performing comparably to, or even surpassing, leading U.S. models at a lower cost.
Baidu stated that “ERNIE X1 delivers performance on par with DeepSeek R1 at only half the price.” The X1 is designed with “stronger understanding, planning, reflection, and evolution capabilities.” Baidu also highlighted that this is the first deep thinking model that uses tools autonomously. These advancements signal Baidu’s commitment to innovation.
Furthermore, Baidu’s latest foundation model, ERNIE 4.5, boasts “excellent multimodal understanding ability.” According to the company, this model has “more advanced language ability, and its understanding, generation, logic, and memory abilities are comprehensively improved.” It also has “high EQ,” exhibiting the capacity to understand internet memes and satirical cartoons.
Despite being among the first Chinese tech giants to introduce a ChatGPT-style chatbot, Baidu’s Ernie large language model has faced challenges in widespread adoption, despite claims of performance comparable to OpenAI’s GPT-4. This ongoing competition underscores the dynamism of the AI market.
Multimodal AI systems are capable of processing and integrating various types of data, including text, video, images, and audio, and can convert content across these formats.
