China’s Baidu announced on Sunday the launch of two new artificial intelligence models, including a reasoning-focused model designed to rival DeepSeek’s offerings, as the company strives to distinguish itself in an increasingly competitive AI sector.
Chinese AI startup DeepSeek has disrupted the industry with AI models it claims can match or surpass leading U.S. models at a significantly lower cost, reigniting the global AI race.
“ERNIE X1 delivers performance on par with DeepSeek R1 at only half the price,” Baidu stated, emphasizing its model’s advanced capabilities in understanding, planning, reflection, and evolution. The company also highlighted ERNIE X1 as the first deep-thinking AI model capable of autonomously using tools.
Additionally, Baidu introduced its latest foundation model, ERNIE 4.5, boasting superior multimodal understanding. The company claims that this model enhances language comprehension, logical reasoning, content generation, and memory.
Baidu further stated that ERNIE 4.5 has “high emotional intelligence” and is adept at interpreting internet memes and satirical cartoons.
As one of the first Chinese tech giants to launch a ChatGPT-style chatbot, Baidu has faced challenges in gaining widespread adoption for its Ernie large language model, despite asserting that it matches OpenAI’s GPT-4 in performance.
