Chinese group Baidu will close in Brazil as part of a new strategy focused on the development of artificial intelligence technologies, the Estado de São Paulo newspaper reported, citing sources close to the Brazilian subsidiary.

Recently the group has been focusing its research and development on artificial intelligence, including autonomous vehicles, reducing the attention it gave to consumer products, for example, establishing a partnership with the US group Ford to develop autonomous management technologies.

The business in Brazil reached 40 million users, mostly due to Peixe Urbano, a company it acquired in 2014 for an undisclosed sum amd sold to US e-commerce group Groupon in 2017. Under Chinese management, Peixe Urbano achieved its first positive results.

The newspaper recalled that Baidu did not have a good reputation among Brazilians – complaints from social network users about the company’s programmes such as Hao123, which were installed on their devices by default or were very difficult to un-install, were common.

Baidu, established on 18 January 2000, is a Chinese technology group specialising in Internet-related and artificial intelligence products and services, based in Beijing. (macauhub)