May 21 (Reuters) - Search engine giant Baidu ( BIDU )

on Wednesday reported a surprise rise in first-quarter

revenue fueled by increasing demand for its AI cloud services.

Baidu ( BIDU ) offset losses in its advertising market by growing

its AI Cloud segment, which provides cloud computing, AI-powered

solutions, and services to enterprises, and drove revenue.

U.S.-listed shares of Baidu ( BIDU ) rose more than 1.4% in

premarket trading.

Revenue in the first quarter stood at 32.45 billion yuan

($4.50 billion), beating analysts' average estimate of 30.9

billion yuan, according to data compiled by LSEG.

Baidu's ( BIDU ) online marketing business, which contributes the

majority of its revenue, fell 6% to 17.31 billion yuan. Analysts

had estimated 17.39 billion yuan.

The company reported profit of 21.59 yuan per American

Depositary Share, compared with profit of 14.91 yuan per share a

year earlier.

($1 = 7.2067 Chinese yuan renminbi)