On the evening of November 21st, Baidu released its financial report for the third quarter of 2024. The financial report shows that Baidu's quarterly total revenue was 33.6 billion yuan, with a net profit of 7.6 billion US dollars, an increase of 14% year-on-year. Baidu's core revenue was 26.5 billion yuan, with a net profit attributable to Baidu Core of 7.54 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 17%. According to the financial report, in November, the daily average call volume of Wenxin's large model reached 1.5 billion times. Compared to the 50 million disclosures in the fourth quarter of last year, it has increased 30 times within a year.
"The revenue of Baidu's core business in the third quarter was basically flat, reflecting the continued weakness of our online marketing business, which was offset by the growth of intelligent cloud business. The increasing use of Wenxin's big model proves that our strong AI capability is gaining wider market recognition. In the field of intelligent driving, Apollo Go continues to lead the global automatic driving taxi market, and our sixth generation autonomous vehicle has reached a new milestone on the public roads of many cities in China." Robin Lee, founder, chairman and CEO of Baidu, said, "Despite the short-term pressure, we still unswervingly adhere to the AI centric strategy, and The long-term development path is full of confidence. As we further expand the scale of AI, we will be more determined to find ways for AI to create value and drive innovation for consumers, businesses, and society
Robin Lee also disclosed in the financial report call that a new version of Wenxin model will be released early next year to strengthen the leading position in the basic model.
Specifically, Baidu's core revenue for this quarter was 26.5 billion yuan, which is basically the same as last year; Online marketing revenue was 18.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 4%, while non online marketing revenue was 7.7 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12%, mainly driven by intelligent cloud business. IQiyi's revenue was 7.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 10%.
As for the decline of online marketing revenue, Robin Lee said in the financial report call, "In general, although our online marketing business is going through a transition period, we are still ready to promote our AI transformation. We are confident that this will bring long-term value to our users, customers and shareholders."
This quarter, Baidu's revenue cost was 16.4 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 1%, mainly due to the increase in traffic acquisition costs and intelligent cloud business related costs, partially offset by the decrease in personnel related expenses and sales costs. Among them, sales and management expenses amounted to RMB 5.9 billion, a year-on-year increase of 2%, mainly due to an increase in channel expenses and promotional marketing expenses, partially offset by a decrease in personnel related expenses; The research and development expenses amounted to 5.4 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 12%, mainly due to a reduction in personnel related expenses.
According to the financial report, in the third quarter, Baidu launched two enhanced lightweight models, ERNIE Speed Pro and ERNIE Lite Pro, further expanding the richness of the Wenxin series models. As of November, the number of PaddlePaddle Wenxin ecological developers has reached 18.08 million.
According to the financial report, in September, the monthly active users of Baidu App reached 704 million, a year-on-year increase of 6%; During the quarter, Baidu's core online marketing revenue was 18.8 billion yuan. Baidu is continuously promoting the reconstruction of search models and enriching the search experience through intelligent agents and other content. Public data shows that there are 150000 enterprises and 800000 developers on the Baidu Wenxin intelligent agent platform; At the recent Baidu World event, Baidu Wenku and Baidu Netdisk jointly released the tool based intelligent agent "Free Canvas", with over 200000 people pre ordering to experience it on the first day.
In the field of autonomous driving, as of October 28th, Baidu's autonomous driving travel service has provided over 8 million rides nationwide; The number of ride hailing services provided in the third quarter reached 988000, a year-on-year increase of 20%. At present, the sixth generation autonomous vehicles have provided services on public roads in multiple cities in China.