Intel, Baidu to jointly develop search apps

Intel China and Chinese search company Baidu.com announced plans on Thursday to jointly develop Internet search applications.

According to terms of the agreement, Baidu and Intel will jointly develop search applications for laptops, mobile phones, and home PCs. The partners didn’t disclose the specific areas of search technology where they plan to cooperate.

As part of the deal, Baidu also agreed to use servers based on Intel processors for its back-end systems.

“In addition to PCs, our users will soon be able to access Baidu search services on their handsets and home devices,” said Jerry Liu, Baidu’s chief technology officer, in a statement. The statement did not clarify how these services would be different from Baidu’s existing mobile search service.

Specific details of the joint development work will be worked out at a later date, said Leo Wang, an Intel China spokesman.

Baidu.com is the most popular Internet search engine in China. It’s nearest rival is Google, which announced plans in March to move its back-end servers from Intel-based systems to servers based on Advanced Micro Devices’ Opteron processor, according to a investment bank report.

The announcement of the partnership between Intel China and Baidu.com comes the day after Google officially opened its Beijing research and development (R&D) lab. The lab could house up to 150 engineers by the middle of this year and eventually become the company’s largest R&D site outside the U.S., Google said.