Latest news with #X1Turbo
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Baidu's AI cloud soars — but the risks are stacking up
China's biggest AI player, Baidu (BIDU), beat expectations with a surge in cloud revenue, but its ad business is shrinking, it's slashing AI prices to stay ahead of local rivals, and fresh U.S. chip export issues could cut its momentum short. In Q1 earnings posted Wednesday, Baidu reported that its AI Cloud revenue jumped 42% year-over-year, and in tandem, net income soared 42% to $951 million. However, the beat was padded by nearly $618 million in investment revaluation gains, not just operational lift. But even as the company leaned hard into enterprise AI, its core ad business fell 6% vs. last year. That decline in online advertising revenue during Q1 2025 looks to be primarily attributed to macro factors, including slowing consumer spending in China. Observers following search volumes on both sides of the Pacific may wonder if Baidu's results recall Alphabet's recent panic when an Apple (AAPL) exec testified regarding reduced search volumes. While there's no direct evidence linking this decline to AI reducing search volumes, it's plausible that the integration of AI technologies, like Baidu's Ernie chatbots, could be altering user behavior. Such a shift could impact ad impressions and click-through rates, with knock-on effects for advertising revenue. However, Baidu has not explicitly stated that AI is the cause of the advertising revenue decline. Speaking of Ernie, Baidu also finds itself in an arms race at home — and racing to undercut. Last month, the tech giant slashed prices on its Ernie 4.5 Turbo model by 80%, and cut pricing on its X1 Turbo model by half, in a bid to stay ahead of domestic competitors like Alibaba (BABA), DeepSeek, ByteDance, and Moonshot AI. Founder Robin Li told developers the company's focus is on 'removing friction,' that is, letting builders create without worrying about model cost or capabilities. It's a slightly different kind of AI boom than the one playing out in the U.S., where Microsoft's (MSFT) Azure grew 33%, Google Cloud 28%, and AWS 17%, with strong monetization and margin performance. Baidu is growing faster, arguably, but it appears to be doing so by sacrificing pricing power and eating capex, corporate moves that can quickly turn into a race to the bottom. It's not that American companies aren't also wary of capex and overall spending, however, with Microsoft recent layoff's suggested ongoing scrutiny of its costs. Complicating matters for Baidu: The U.S. Commerce Department's recent guidance warning against Huawei's Ascend AI chips has reignited geopolitical risk, if it ever died down at all. Chinese officials called the move 'unilateral bullying,' and Baidu — reliant on domestic chip supply — is caught in the crossfire. Baidu's ambitions aren't limited to China. The company's autonomous driving unit, Apollo Go, began operating its first robotaxis in Dubai this month — part of a push to commercialize AI on a global scale and an understandable move given the massive AI opportunity in the middle east, which American tech companies are themselves racing to capitalize on, per Wedbush. Baidu's AI ambitions are real and, to an extent, already paying off. But they're unfolding in a market that's fragmented, subsidized, and shadowed by geopolitics. Cost-cutting is helping to improve results for now, with longer-term effects not yet clear. Calling the outlook 'cloudy' seems fair. For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
South China Morning Post
26-04-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Baidu offers new AI models with enhanced features, lower cost than DeepSeek's products
Baidu on Friday launched two new artificial intelligence (AI) models that offer enhanced multimodal reasoning capabilities and cost less than comparable products from DeepSeek Advertisement At a developer conference held in Wuhan, capital of central Hubei province, Baidu co-founder, chairman and chief executive Robin Li Yanhong unveiled the multimodal Ernie 4.5 Turbo and X1 Turbo reasoning models. According to Li, Ernie 4.5 Turbo costs about 40 per cent less than DeepSeek's namesake V3 large language model (LLM), while X1 Turbo is being offered at a quarter of the price of the Hangzhou-based AI start-up 's R1 reasoning model. 'The essence of innovation is the lowering of cost,' Li said in his keynote speech, which stretched more than an hour. He pointed out that this would help developers focus on creating 'more super interesting and useful' AI applications, rather than the expense involved in a foundational AI model. That view reflects Li's earlier forecast about the exponential growth of AI apps in China this year. Advertisement
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Business Standard
25-04-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
DeepSeek demand shrinking: Baidu founder notes shift away from text-only AI
Baidu Co-founder Robin Li said the demand for text-only generative AI models — such as those developed by industry frontrunner DeepSeek — is 'shrinking', in a direct swipe at one of China's most high-profile AI companies. Speaking at Baidu's developer conference on Friday, as reported by the Financial Times, Li claimed that while DeepSeek's large language models had gained early traction, they were now limited by their text-only capabilities. He criticised the models for a higher rate of so-called 'hallucinations', as well as slower performance and greater cost compared to rival domestic offerings. DeepSeek rapid rise in AI ecosystem DeepSeek had rapidly risen to prominence in China's artificial intelligence (AI) ecosystem. The company surged ahead in January with the release of its R1 model, widely seen as a significant leap in reasoning capabilities, and has since become the dominant player in the country's large language model (LLM) space. Competition heats up among AI firms While Baidu was the first to respond to the release of OpenAI's ChatGPT in 2022 with its Erniebot, DeepSeek and others have since entered the competitive landscape. Baidu was ultimately forced to open-source its models after subscription uptake fell flat, amid a wave of free alternatives. In response to DeepSeek's dominance, rivals have been racing to catch up. Baidu's newly launched Ernie 4.5 Turbo and X1 Turbo feature multimodal capabilities — spanning text, image, audio and video — in a bid to outpace DeepSeek's more narrowly focused approach. Alibaba has also made aggressive moves in the space, releasing its open-source QwQ model, which it claims matches DeepSeek's performance with far less training data. Baidu has integrated DeepSeek's models into several of its own platforms, including its enterprise Qianfan offering and its search and map products — underlining the influence DeepSeek continues to hold across the AI landscape. Other tech giants have also scrambled to enter the fray. ByteDance's Doubao chatbot and Tencent's Yuanbao AI assistant have both challenged Baidu's earlier momentum, while Alibaba's Qwen platform has emerged as a key rival in both capability and scale. DeepSeek, meanwhile, remains focused on future development, with its R2 and V4 models in the pipeline. Baidu's latest models could speed up AI-adoption According to the report by Financial Times, Baidu's latest moves could help speed up the adoption of AI technologies across industries, lower entry barriers for developers, and further fuel the growing competition among China's leading cloud and AI providers.
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
China's Baidu upgrades Ernie AI models and slashes prices
(Bloomberg) — Baidu Inc. (BIDU) unveiled upgrades to its flagship AI models and slashed their prices as it looks to take on rivals like Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (BABA) and DeepSeek in China's increasingly competitive artificial intelligence market. Trump Gives New York 'One Last Chance' to End Congestion Fee Why Car YouTuber Matt Farah Is Fighting for Walkable Cities Backyard Micro-Flats Aim to Ease South Africa's Housing Crisis The Racial Wealth Gap Is Not Just About Money To Fuel Affordable Housing, This Innovation Fund Targets Predevelopment Costs The Chinese search engine leader rolled out Ernie 4.5 Turbo and Ernie X1 Turbo, the latest versions of its flagship foundation and reasoning models that it said are faster and cheaper than previous iterations. Billionaire founder Robin Li told a developer conference in Wuhan that the price of the 4.5 Turbo is 80% lower than its previous version, while the X1 Turbo - Baidu's answer to DeepSeek — cut its price by half. Baidu shares rose more than 5% in Hong Kong on Friday. 'All these releases are meant to allow developers to focus on building applications without worrying about model capabilities, model costs, or development tools and platforms,' Li said. The company also launched a slew of products including an AI agent platform known as Xinxiang, which it said can automate everyday tasks, bringing competition to Chinese service Manus AI. Baidu also added new servers that it said will allow developers to connect their AI models to the company's search-engine and e-commerce data. The company has produced 30,000 AI chips that it's now using, Li said, without elaborating. The Beijing-based company was the first in China's trillion-dollar tech sector to launch a chatbot modeled after OpenAI's ChatGPT, but rival chatbots from ByteDance Ltd. and Moonshot AI soon took over in popularity. Open-sourced models like Alibaba's Qwen and DeepSeek have gained greater recognition within the global developer community. As More Women Lift Weights, Gyms Might Never Be the Same Why US Men Think College Isn't Worth It Anymore Eight Charts Show Men Are Falling Behind, From Classrooms to Careers India's 110% Car Tariffs Become Harder to Defend in Trump Era The Mastermind of the Yellowstone Universe Isn't Done Yet ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. By subscribing, you are agreeing to Yahoo's Terms and Privacy Policy Sign in to access your portfolio
