Baidu's ChatGPT-like Ernie bot garners 100 million user mark

Baidu's ChatGPT-like Ernie Bot has achieved a remarkable user base, surpassing 100 million users, according to the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of the company.

Wang Haifeng, chief technology officer of the Chinese internet company, said on Thursday about the increasing number of users on new bot.

The announcement of surpassing the user base milestone occurred during a deep learning summit in Beijing, following Baidu's decision to make Ernie Bot accessible to the public in August.

Prior to this public release, there was a partial unveiling and an extensive five-month trial phase, during which selected users had the opportunity to evaluate the chatbot's capabilities.

While the initial partial unveiling in March may have been perceived as less impressive, analysts emphasize that it granted the company a valuable first-mover advantage in an increasingly competitive market. The landscape is now populated with numerous players as both large and small Chinese tech companies actively pursue the development of their own chatbots utilizing generative artificial intelligence (AI).

This occurred subsequent to the debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT in late 2022, which quickly ascended to become the world's fastest-growing software application within a span of six months.

Following this success, OpenAI has garnered a valuation exceeding $80 billion from investors. Despite OpenAI being a nonprofit entity, Microsoft has made a $13 billion investment in a for-profit subsidiary, aiming to acquire a 49% stake.

Throughout this year, Baidu CEO Robin Li has consistently emphasized the potential of Ernie Bot and related products to enhance the company's market presence across its core businesses, such as the search engine, cloud services, and smart cars.

As per a ranking released by SuperCLUE on Thursday, Ernie Bot stands as the top Chinese chatbot, yet its score of 79.02 falls more than 10 points behind the latest iteration of ChatGPT.