Baidu, the Chinese equivalent to Google, has announced plans to set up a venture capital fund to invest in artificial intelligence.

The 1 billion yuan ($145 million) fund will look to back start-ups that are focused on content generated by AI apps.

Baidu said that it would also launch a competition for developers to build applications with its ERNIE large language model (LLM) or integrate the model into their existing products.

China is heavily investing in generative AI tech following the explosive emergence of Microsoft-backed ChatGPT and other western chatbots such as Google’s Bard. Almost 80 Chinese companies have launched their own LLMs since 2020, with companies in the country outpacing the US so far this year.

Baidu’s Ernie Bot was announced earlier this year and has been in development since 2019. However, its official unveiling in March sent Baidu shares tumbling after investors were disappointed by the use of pre-recorded videos and the lack of a public launch date in its presentation.

Share Story: