(March 3): Baidu Inc, the operator of China’s leading search engine, is planning to offer about 10 billion yuan (US$1.4 billion or RM6.12 billion) of bonds offshore, people familiar with the matter said, adding to a string of recent debt financing by the nation’s tech companies. 

The deal will consist of a five-year note to yield 2.6% to 2.8%, and a 10-year security at 2.8% to 3.0%, according to the people, who asked not to be identified. It may price on Wednesday. The size has increased from earlier discussions of a total of at least four billion yuan.

This would be Baidu’s first bond offering since 2021, and would come before it must repay a US$600 million security due April 7, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Other Chinese tech companies have been active in debt financing markets recently. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd, the Chinese internet pioneer co-founded by Jack Ma, priced about US$5 billion of dollar and yuan bonds in November. That was its first public note offering in nearly four years after it also sold US$5 billion of convertible securities in a private offering in May.

The financings come at a time when major industry players on both sides of the Pacific have rolled out artificial intelligence models at a rapid clip, from OpenAI to Alibaba. The series of introductions underscore a dramatically quickened pace of development since DeepSeek stunned Silicon Valley with a model that matched the best from OpenAI and Meta Platforms Inc.

Uploaded by Siow Chen Ming