Baidu’s profit up 42% in Q1

Beijing, 21st May: Baidu, the leading Chinese language Internet search company, has recently reported revenues of US$4.5 billion for the quarter ended 31st March 2025, which is an increase of 3% year-on-year. The company’s net profit in the quarter jumped 42%, reaching US$1.1 billion. Diluted earnings per share in the quarter were RMB 2.70 (US$0.37).

More than 53% of Baidu’s revenues were generated from its online marketing services, amounting to US$2.4 billion, which presents a drop of 6.4% year-on-year. The remaining revenues, categorised as “other” grew 16%, amounting to US$2.1 billion. According to the company, its AI business was still the key growth driver of its revenues.

Robin Li, Co-founder and CEO of Baidu, was quoted, “Baidu Core revenue grew 7% year over year in the first quarter, driven by the accelerating momentum of AI Cloud, which surged 42% year over year. The strong performance of our AI Cloud business underscores the growing market recognition of our distinctive strength in providing full-stack AI products and solutions with a highly competitive price-performance advantage. We also achieved a pivotal milestone in our robotaxi business, as Apollo Go expanded internationally by entering Dubai and Abu Dhabi, reinforcing our commitment to bringing safe, comfortable, and affordable autonomous ride-hailing services to global markets. We are confident that our AI-first strategy positions us to remain at the forefront and to capture long-term growth opportunities in the AI era.”