Chinese tech giant Baidu banks on AI search engine to regain market share

Success of 'smarter' search box depends on whether it can bring in advertising dollars

- Lim Min Zhang

BEIJING - Chinese tech giant Baidu has unveiled the most significant upgrade to its search engine in years, promising more accurate and useful answers using artificial intelligence (AI), amid competition from the likes of Douyin and Xiaohongshu.

On July 2, Baidu announced a larger, "smarter" search box, allowing users to type in queries of more than 1,000 words using natural language, including multipart questions, instead of just traditional searches using keywords.

But whether China's largest search engine - which has faced falling market share in recent years - can turn the tide will depend on how successful it is in improving user experience while monetising its latest AI upgrade, said analysts.

At a media event in Beijing, Baidu representatives showed off its search engine's ability to produce smartphone recommendations arranged by different price categories, and pull up relevant videos, in response to a request for "electronic products suitable for gifts".

Previously, a similar search would have yielded only a list of relevant links.

The revamped search function will also try to anticipate users' needs.

A query on "Beijing GDP (gross domestic product)" should not only return the correct figure, Baidu said, but also pull up graphs showing how the annual economic output has changed over time, as well as analyses by bloggers.

"We realised that the search box that has been with us for more than 20 years needs to undertake new responsibilities," said Ms Chen Yingmei, a manager with Baidu search, who gave a demonstration of the feature onstage.