Beijing – April 25, 2025
At its annual developer conference, Baidu has made significant strides in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), unveiling a major upgrade in its hardware and AI models. Robin Li, the CEO of Baidu, proudly announced the successful activation, or “illumination,” of a vast 30,000-chip cluster made up of Baidu’s self-developed third-generation P800 Kunlun chips. This move positions Baidu as a key player in AI infrastructure capable of supporting cutting-edge DeepSeek-like models with hundreds of billions of parameters. These chips can simultaneously support the training of thousands of customized AI models with billions of parameters.
The P800 chip cluster is designed to manage complex AI training tasks, marking a leap in Baidu’s AI capabilities. Li explained that the cluster could support up to a thousand customers fine-tuning AI models concurrently, enhancing the company’s ability to meet growing demand in AI development.
Li also unveiled Baidu’s new AI model, Ernie 4.5 Turbo, which the company claims performs at par with industry leaders in several benchmark tests. The model demonstrates advanced capabilities, from coding to linguistic comprehension, further solidifying Baidu’s presence in the competitive AI landscape. In addition to Ernie 4.5 Turbo, Baidu introduced Ernie X1 Turbo, a new reasoning-focused model designed to solve more complex tasks requiring nuanced understanding.
Baidu’s innovations don’t end with models, as the company also emphasized its focus on AI applications. Li remarked, “There are many AI models, but it’s apps that rule the world. Without apps, models and chips are worthless.” This underscores the company’s strategic focus on embedding its AI technologies across its diverse ecosystem, including its cloud platform, Baidu Wenku (content platform), and other core services.
The announcement comes amid intense competition in China’s AI market, as tech companies shift focus from developing foundational models to creating practical, user-centric applications that drive adoption and user retention. Despite being an early investor in AI following the 2022 launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Baidu’s Ernie Bot has yet to match the success of competitors like ChatGPT, and the company is keen on ensuring its new AI models resonate with both businesses and consumers.
Baidu’s latest developments in AI and hardware have the potential to significantly impact industries from finance to content creation, positioning the company as a leader in AI infrastructure and applications in China and beyond.
