China's AI Ambitions Get a Boost as Baidu Makes Ernie Bot Freely Accessible

Aims to become global leader in AI by 2030

Chinese search engine giant Baidu has made its conversational AI model Ernie Bot fully available to the public, sending the company's stock price up over 3%. Baidu CEO Robin Li hopes that collecting real-world feedback through public use will help improve Ernie Bot and Baidu's foundation models.

The move comes as China aims to become a global leader in artificial intelligence by 2030. Following the popular launch of ChatGPT by OpenAI, Chinese tech firms have raced to unveil their own generative AI models that can produce and create new content.

While regulating the industry, China's new AI rules require companies to review models for security and comply with government data requests before public release. However, Li remains optimistic, describing the regulations as more pro-innovation focused. Two other Chinese AI companies, Baichuan and Zhipu AI, also launched their language models on the same day as Baidu's announcement.