iFlytek (科大讯飞, 002230.SZ), one of China’s largest speech recognition and AI champions, announced today that it will release its own large language model (LLM) at 2pm (GMT+8) on May 6 — the latest in a series of moves by domestic tech companies to jump on the ChatGPT bandwagon.
According to iFlytek, the pre-trained model, named xinghuo renzhi in pinyin, will acquire cross-disciplinary knowledge and a language comprehensive ability after being fed a large quantity of text, code and knowledge to enhance its levels of intelligence.
The model is said to be capable of understanding and handling tasks based on NLP (natural language processing) technologies.
Meanwhile, iFlytek published its 2022 financial results on April 20, posting revenue of 18.82 billion yuan (US$2.72 billion), up 2.77% year on year.
The company recorded a gross margin of 7.68 billion yuan, an increase of 2% over the previous year. Its net profit attributable to shareholders amounted to 561 million yuan.
In a statement issued by iFlytek, the company said it continues to maintain its global leadership position in core technologies.
Riding on the waves of a domestic race to produce China’s answer to ChatGPT, iFlytek will seize the opportunity and use world-leading key technologies to provide strong backing for its concrete business, in a bid to consolidate its technological barrier and leadership, said the company.
With the announcement, iFlytek has joined a number of Chinese tech companies, including Baidu, Alibaba, JD and more, in development of a ChatGPT-like generative AI tool.
Toward the end of 2022, the Hefei-based titan officially started working on a breakthrough in what it called “1+N cognitive intelligence large model.”
Aside from the model, iFlytek will also unveil five new products and applications at the May 6 event, such as an AI-powered learning tool, real-time speech-transcribing software, an office netbook, a smart cockpit and an open platform.
