Alibaba tests ChatGPT rival as China´s Baidu race to build AI chatbot

Beijing, Apr 9 (Prensa Latina) Alibaba Group Holding said it is testing a ChatGPT-like service that takes advantage of its years of research in large language models, joining web search giant Baidu in a rush to create China’s answer to San Francisco-based OpenAI’s chatbot, which has set off a frenzy among investors and the general public.

April 9, 2023
10:01

The brand-new project is called Tongyi Qianwen and the company is presently sending invitations to other firms to use it as part of the testing period.

The company’s CEO Daniel Zhang is planning to officially launch the new project on April 11 at an event on Alibaba’s cloud storage services.

In China, several tech giants are currently developing their own ChatGPT versions, adding to global frenzy uncovered by this tool.

The e-commerce platform JD.com, the online game developer NetEase and the search engine Baidu revealed their own projects to create systems similar to that of the U.S. company OpenAI.

But industry experts assured the Chinese proposals will be quite different from the American ones, as they will focus their apps on the business field.

Alibaba will integrate it into cloud storage services. JD.com will use it in sales and finance operations, while NetEase will link it to its products designed for education.

Experts forecast the success of these ventures, pointing to China’s large number of cybernauts, large accumulation of data and access to AI-based language systems.

Many social science journals and university publications in China have warned they will reject the work of researchers who use such a system to shape them.

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