BEIJING, June 25 (Reuters) -

Chinese artificial intelligence(AI) companies are moving

swiftly to attract users of OpenAI's technology, following

reports that the U.S. firm plans to restrict access to its API

in China and other countries.

ChatGPT maker OpenAI is planning to block access to

technology used to build AI products for entities in China and

some other countries, Chinese state-owned newspaper Securities

Times reported on Tuesday.

ChatGPT is not available in mainland China but many Chinese

startups have been able to access OpenAI's application

programming interface (API) platform and use it to build their

own applications, the Securities Times said.

It added that since late Monday, Chinese users of the

platform have received emails warning they are in a "region that

OpenAI does not currently support" and that additional measures

to block API traffic from some regions would be taken starting

July 9.

In response, Baidu ( BIDU ) , China's leading AI developer,

said it would launch an "inclusive Program" offering new users

free migration to its Ernie platform.

For OpenAI users, Baidu ( BIDU ) will provide additional Ernie

3.5 flagship model tokens, matching the scale of their OpenAI

usage, Baidu's ( BIDU ) cloud unit said in a statement. Tokens are units

of text processed by AI models.

Alibaba Cloud also joined in, offering free tokens and

migration services for OpenAI API users through its AI platform.

The company's Qwen-plus model is priced significantly lower than

GPT-4, according to Alibaba.

Zhipu AI, another major player in China's AI sector,

announced a "Special Migration Program" for OpenAI API users.

"Our GLM model fully benchmarks against OpenAI's product

ecosystem," Zhipu AI said in a statement to developers seen by

Reuters. "With our entirely self-developed technology, we ensure

security and controllability."

Numerous Chinese companies have released chatbots powered by

their own AI models over the past year.