First we got Microsoft-backed ChatGPT, then Google's Bard was announced, and now China is joining the chatbot craze by preparing to launch "Ernie Bot."
As Reuters reports, Ernie is short for "Enhanced Representation through Knowledge Integration," and is being developed by Chinese tech company Baidu (best known for its search engine and mapping service).
Baidu has been working on Ernie's AI-powered language model since 2019, and it's expected to be launched as a standalone service/app at some point in March.
Little is known about Ernie beyond claims it can understand language, generate language, and produce images from text. Eventually, Baidu will integrate Ernie into its search engine, just like Microsoft plans to integrate ChatGPT into Bing.
As many Western companies don't or can't operate within China, Ernie is likely to be the first time many Chinese internet users will get to interact with an intelligent chatbot. Whether it's as capable as either ChatGPT or Bard is yet to be seen, but as development has been ongoing for over four years, it would be more surprising if Ernie isn't a match for them.
For now, ChatGPT has set the standard for other chatbots to try and beat. Google is only testing Bard with a small group of people right now, so it's feasible Ernie could launch publicly before Bard. However, it's unlikely Ernie will be offered outside of China, at least initially. Meanwhile, OpenAI is preparing to launch a paid version of ChatGPT, called ChatGPT Plus, for $20 per month.