A Chinese voice assistant has been rapidly gaining ground in recent months. DuerOS, Baidu’s answer to Amazon’s Alexa, reached over 200 million devices, China’s top search engine announced on its
Weibo official account last Friday.
To put that number into context, more than 100 million devices pre-installed with Alexa have been sold, Amazon
recently said. Google just announced it expected Assitant to be on
1 billion devices by the end of this month.
Voice interaction technology is part of Baidu’s strategy to reposition itself from a heavy reliance on search businesses towards artificial intelligence. The grand plan took a hit when the world-renown scientist
Lu Qi stepped down as Baidu’s chief operating officer, though the segment appears to have scored healthy growth lately, with DuerOS more than doubling from a base of
90 million installs since last June.
When it comes to how many devices actually use DuerOS regularly, the number is much less significant: 35 million machines a month at the time Baidu’s general manager for smart home devices
announced the figure last November.
Like Alexa, which has made its way into both Amazon-built Echo speakers and OEMs, DuerOS also takes a platform play to power both Baidu-built and third-party devices.
Interestingly, DuerOS has achieved all that with fewer capabilities and a narrower partnership network than its American counterpart. By the end of 2018, Alexa could perform
more than 56,000 skills. Devices from over 4,500 brands can now be controlled with Alexa,
says Amazon. By comparison, Baidu’s voice assistant had 800 different skills, its chief architect Zhong Lei
revealed at the company’s November event. It was compatible with 85 brands at the time.
The number of Alexa skills in the U.S. more than doubled in 2018
