Microsoft Veteran Will Help Run Chinese Search Giant Baidu
- AI specialist Qi Lu becomes Baidu’s COO and president
- Lu will oversee Baidu’s efforts to develop AI technologies
Qi Lu.
Photographer: David Paul Morris/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Baidu Inc. has appointed former Microsoft Corp. executive Qi Lu its group president and chief operating officer, granting the software industry veteran oversight over all aspects of the Chinese search giant’s business from sales to technology development.
Lu, an architect of Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella’s strategy for artificial intelligence and bots at Microsoft, will take up his new post with immediate effect, Baidu said in an e-mailed statement Tuesday. Every Baidu business unit head will report to Lu, a respected technologist who ran the Office and search groups during his tenure at Microsoft.