By Sherry Qin
China's Baidu unveiled a new generative artificial intelligence model that it said rivals OpenAI's ChatGPT, as part of its efforts to lead the race for AI development in the world's second-largest economy.
Baidu, the owner of China's largest internet search engine, on Tuesday introduced the latest version of its model known as Ernie, saying that it reflects improvements in understanding, generation, logic and memory.
Ernie 4.0's capabilities are "not inferior to GPT-4," Chief Executive Robin Li said at an event, according to a statement, referring to the latest AI-powered language model developed by San Francisco-based OpenAI.
Baidu's new AI model will be used to update the company's search engine, map and other applications, with the search engine capable of generating answers with text, pictures and charts, it said. The AI model will be able to accurately locate a certain frame of a video or summarize an hour-long video within a few seconds, Baidu added.
Baidu was among the first of China's tech titans to launch a generative AI model, after it veiled an earlier version of Ernie in March.
Write to Sherry Qin at sherry.qin@wsj.com
