BEIJING, January 29 (AsianFin)—Qihoo 360 Technology has officially launched "360 AI Search", the upgraded search app based on large models, in various Android app stores.

The "360 AI Search" was touted as a "next-generation answer engine," designed to offer more relevant and comprehensive answers for complex search queries.

The iOS version of "360 AI Search" was launched on the Apple App Store last Friday but was taken down within 22 hours for unknown reasons. As of the press time, the iOS version has not been available. 

This move points to another simmering AI search battle between 360 and Baidu. Unlike 12 years ago, both companies are foraying into the field of "artificial intelligence (AI) Search."

As the global AI landscape experiences a surge, particularly with ChatGPT gaining popularity in 2023, the market anticipates a transformation in the search engine sector. Microsoft, in response, introduced the AI search product "New Bing" based on GPT-4.

As the top search engine in China, Baidu had previously introduced AI search, incorporating the Baidu "ERNIE Bot" large-model technology for Chat AI conversation features directly within the search page.

In April 2023, Zhou Hongyi, the founder and Chairman of Qihoo 360 Technology, said the company will continue intensive in-house research on large language models while launching relevant product services for specific scenarios.

Zhou also noted that Qihoo 360 Technology will launch China's first AI search engine and AI personal assistant products based on the search scenario, which will disrupt traditional search method to offer more intelligent and convenient user experiences.

"On the user side, 360 has learned from the New Bing model to combine the 360GPT product matrix "360 Smart Brain" with the search scenario, and launched a new generation of intelligent search engine," Zhou said.

The launch of "360 Search" in August 2012 pitted Baidu against 360. Baidu sued Qihoo 360, and on April 27, 2013, Beijing No.1 Intermediate People's Court ruled that 360 lost the case and asked Qihoo 360 to stop unfair competition, apologize on its homepage for 15 consecutive days and compensate Baidu for 450,000 yuan (US$62,650).

Although 360 Company lost the case, this incident promoted the booming of the search engine market in China, such as the emerging Sogou Search and 360 Search.

As of December 2023, Baidu ranked the top with a 66.52% share of the Chinese search engine market. The domestic version of Bing holds a 13.32% market share, while 360 Search ranked third with a 6.43% share, surpassing Tencent's Sogou, the latest Statcounter data showed.

Amid the AI boom, 360 urgently needs to continuously enhance its search business to form higher technical and product "barriers". "The main task in 2023 was how to make a large model, and the main task in 2024 is how to use a large model," Zhou said.