News broke last week that leading Chinese language searching engine, Baidu, has hired Andrew Ng, who is touted as the man behind the ‘Google Brain’. The Google Brain is an artificial intelligence project that aspires to recreate the human brain, and reports say that Baidu is working on something similar.
What Does This Mean For The Future Of Baidu?
While Baidu is the fifth most popular website in the world, according to Alexa, it has virtually no presence outside of the market it serves. To truly live up to its moniker of ‘The Google of China’, Baidu is making strides to expand its presence into Silicon Valley.
Last year, Baidu opened a research outpost in Cupertino, California, which is dedicated to deep learning. Deep learning is a field related to artificial intelligence that aims to improve computing tasks by imitating the way the human brain works.
Since launching their Institute of Deep Learning, Baidu has made significant achievements in image recognition and image-based search, voice recognition, natural language processing and semantic intelligence, machine translation, and advertising matching.
According to the company’s official announcement, Baidu will invest $300 million into a larger research and development center in Sunnyvale, California, which will be led by Andrew Ng. With Ng leading both the research center in Sunnyvale, and Baidu’s existing research center in Beijing, he states the he will “advance fundamental technologies in AI and other areas that can truly change the world.”
Will Baidu Be Expanding Into International Markets?
One question on everyone’s mind since the announcement of Baidu hiring Ng and opening a new research facility in Silicon Valley, is whether or not this is an indication of future plans to expand into international markets.
Baidu’s official announcement didn’t lead on to whether that is, or is not, part of Baidu’s future plans. But that doesn’t mean it’s not still open to speculation. Baidu’s hiring of Ng is a move that closely resembles what other companies have done as they make steps toward expanding globally.
Roughly ten years ago, Google hired a research and development executive working at Microsoft, by the name of Lee Kai-fu. Lee went on to spearhead the expansion of Google search into China. Lee later resigned when, in 2010, Google withdrew itself from the Chinese market.
You can also point to steps taken by Tencent, a leading Chinese Internet company. Tencent opened a game development center in Silicon Valley, and later went on to make news when the company announced it would open a US office for its popular WeChat mobile messaging app as it pursued a global market expansion.
A further example can be seen by China’s largest retailer, Suning. Suning announced last year that it would open a research and development center in Silicon Valley in an effort to transform itself from a traditional retailer into a worldwide Internet retailer.
Baidu’s Potential Next Big Move
As you can see, Baidu is following similar moves made by other companies with their opening of a research and development center in Silicon Valley. If previous examples are anything to learn from, Baidu’s latest move could indicate that it is planning to get serious about expanding outside of China.
Baidu has actually already made a few small moves to expand outside of China, but they have been met with minimal success. To succeed at expanding into other markets, Baidu has to further develop its search technology to exceed, or at least be on par with, that of its main competitors.
With that being said, Baidu’s opening new research and development center led by Andrew Ng is a good sign that it is ready to put in the effort needed to improve its technology before (potentially) pursuing an expansion into western markets.
It’s impossible to say anything for sure at this point, but with history being the greatest indicator, Baidu may very well be taking the first steps towards expanding into international markets within the next few years.
