Baidu Launches $145 Million Venture Capital Fund for Startups Working on AI

The company will also launch a competition for developers to build applications off its ERNIE large language model.

By Reuters | Updated: 31 May 2023 17:43 IST

Baidu Launches $145 Million Venture Capital Fund for Startups Working on AI

Photo Credit: Reuters

Chinese tech companies have raced to release their own LLMs following the dramatic success of ChatGPT

Highlights

Almost 80 organisations in China have launched their own LLMs since 2020
ChatGPT was released last year by Microsft-backed OpenAI
In March, Baidu unveiled Ernie Bot

Chinese search giant Baidu will set up a venture capital fund of CNY 1 billion (roughly Rs. 1,200 crore) to back start-ups focused on content generated by artificial intelligence applications, it said on Wednesday.

The company will also launch a competition for developers to build applications off its ERNIE large language model (LLM) or integrate the model into their existing products, it added.

Chinese tech companies have raced to release their own LLMs following the dramatic success of ChatGPT, the AI-powered chatbot released by Microsft-backed OpenAI.

Baidu's Generative AI Model Ernie 3.5 Is Launching 'Very Soon', Says CEO

Almost 80 organisations in China have launched their own LLMs since 2020, with releases this year slightly exceeding those of the United States, a report showed this week.

In March, Baidu unveiled Ernie Bot, its own AI-powered LLM. E-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding was among the other Chinese companies that followed quickly.

In response to the surge of LLMs, China published draft regulations in April on the use of generative AI.

Tencent to Cut Cloud Services Prices by Up to 40 Percent to Match Rivals

© Thomson Reuters 2023

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