In a major strategic reversal, Chinese search engine giant Baidu has announced it will open-source its next-generation artificial intelligence model, Ernie 4.5, starting June 30, 2025. This decision represents a dramatic shift for CEO Robin Li, who had long advocated for closed-source models as the only viable path for AI development.
The announcement comes amid intensifying competition in China's AI landscape, particularly from Hangzhou-based startup DeepSeek, whose open-source AI models have gained significant traction since their January release. DeepSeek's models have demonstrated performance comparable to those from US-based companies like OpenAI but at substantially lower operational costs, disrupting the market and forcing established players to reconsider their strategies.
Baidu is also making its AI chatbot, Ernie Bot, completely free for all users starting April 1, 2025, approximately 18 months after introducing premium versions. According to January 2025 data from AI product tracker Aicpb.com, Ernie Bot currently has about 13 million active monthly users, trailing behind ByteDance's Doubao (78.6 million) and DeepSeek (33.7 million).
The company has already released two new AI models in March 2025: Ernie 4.5, a multimodal foundation model, and Ernie X1, a reasoning model that Baidu claims delivers performance comparable to DeepSeek R1 at half the price. Both models feature enhanced capabilities in processing text, images, audio, and video.
Li, speaking at the World Government Summit in Dubai, acknowledged the benefits of open-source development: "If you open things up, a lot of people will be curious enough to try it. This will help spread the technology much faster." This sentiment reflects a broader shift in China's AI sector toward open-source strategies, with companies like Alibaba and Tencent also releasing open-source AI models.
Baidu plans to launch its next-generation model, Ernie 5, in the second half of 2025, which will reportedly feature significant enhancements in multimodal capabilities. Industry analysts suggest this open-source pivot could accelerate AI adoption in China and potentially reshape the global AI landscape as Chinese models achieve performance metrics comparable to Western counterparts at lower prices.