Chinese tech giant Baidu has released two new free-to-use artificial intelligence models as it vies to regain its leading position in the country’s fiercely competitive AI space
The Baidu models launched on Sunday 16th March 2025 included the company’s first reasoning-focused model and come ahead of plans to move towards an open-source strategy.
However, analysts reportedly said that while the release of the models is a positive development for Baidu, they also highlight how it is playing catch up as its Ernie bot – one of China’s earliest versions of a ChatGPT-like chatbot – struggles to gain widespread adoption.
‘The new models make Baidu more competitive since the company has been lagging behind in a reasoning model release’, one expert is reported as saying.
A reasoning model is a large language model that breaks down tasks into smaller pieces and considers multiple approaches before generating a response. It is designed to process complex problems in a similar way to humans.
Chinese startup DeepSeek upended the global AI race and transformed China’s ecosystem in January when it released its R1 reasoning model, which rivalled American competitors despite costing a fraction of the price.