Chinese tech giant Baidu has unveiled two new artificial intelligence (AI) models, further fueling competition in the rapidly evolving AI sector. Among these, one model emphasises advanced reasoning capabilities,

DeepSeek has emerged as the new standard for AI model makers to beat after launching R1 just before Christmas. As a reasoning model, R1 stood out for matching the capabilities of the best U.S.-made AI models, despite its maker only spending a small fraction of the cost its rivals had spent in training it.

Tech giant Alibaba, which has pledged to invest heavily in artificial intelligence, says its new reasoning model rivals DeepSeek and OpenAI’s.