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Baidu VP: Forcing AI in the office won't work; we give each employee 1,000 yuan monthly to play with models

Baidu is taking a hands-off approach to getting its employees to embrace AI—and it's paying off. In a recent interview, Shen Dou, Baidu's Executive Vice President and head of its Intelligent Cloud unit, explained why forcing AI adoption in the workplace rarely works.

No Mandates, Just Incentives

Shen Dou revealed that Baidu has never required employees to use AI tools. Instead, the company offers a monthly allowance of 1,000 yuan to each employee, letting them freely experiment with various mainstream large language models. There are no restrictions on how they use it, and it's not tied to any performance review. The goal is simple: lower the barrier to trying AI.

"Once employees experience firsthand how AI can make their work easier and more efficient, they'll naturally start using it regularly," Shen Dou said. He believes that genuine adoption comes from personal discovery, not top-down mandates.

AI Revenue Surpasses Half of Baidu's Total

The strategy seems to be working. In the first quarter of 2026, Baidu's AI revenue grew 49% year-over-year, accounting for 52% of the company's total revenue. It's the first time AI has contributed more than half of Baidu's earnings.

Shen Dou sees the next three years as a critical window. He predicts that general-purpose and industry-specific AI agents will see mass deployment by the second half of 2026. Eventually, he says, 90% of work will involve deep AI assistance—but not full replacement of humans.

A New Metric for the AI Era

At the Create 2026 Baidu AI Developer Conference in May, Baidu founder Li Yanhong proposed a new way to measure success in the AI era: Daily Active Agents (DAA). He argued that while token consumption is currently a popular metric, it measures cost, not value. DAA, he said, better reflects how many agents are actually working for people and delivering results.

Key Points

  • Baidu gives each employee a monthly 1,000 yuan allowance to freely try AI models, with no mandates or performance links.
  • Shen Dou says forcing AI adoption is ineffective; natural adoption comes from personal experience.
  • Baidu's AI revenue grew 49% YoY in Q1 2026, now making up 52% of total revenue.
  • Li Yanhao proposes Daily Active Agents (DAA) as a better metric than token consumption.
  • The next three years are seen as a crucial window for AI agent deployment.