The blockchain laboratory of Baidu, China’s internet search giant, has released its first ever blockchain white paper, titled “Baidu Blockchain White Paper V1.0” on Wednesday. It outlines the development of XuperChain, Baidu’s independently-developed blockchain network and the company’s commercial blockchain solutions.

According to the white paper, Baidu’s XuperChain network is more efficient than traditional blockchains since its “super nodes” use multi-core parallel computing to maximize CPU utilization and increase throughout.

The XuperChain is a stereo network that supports parallel chains and sidechains. There is a root chain in the network which manages parallel chains and operating parameters of the entire network, that supports data exchange between different chains. Within this stereo network, the parallel chain can be either a public blockchain or a permissioned blockchain.

The XuperChain operates on what is called a “pluggable consensus mechanism”. Specifically, within the network, the XuperChain allows different parallel chains to adopt their own consensus mechanisms. It also supports consensus escalation through a voting mechanism. Besides, Baidu’s blockchain arm plans to launch XuperChain App which allows users to get access to DApps which are built upon the network.

It’s noteworthy that the XuperChain has full independent intellectual property rights, including more than 50 technology patents.

The paper also details Baidu’s Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS) solution which is rolled out in January and tailored towards enterprises and its six blockchain applications, including Totem, blockchainized Baidu Baike, Duyuzhou, Baidu Association, Treasure Box and Hubert.

Baidu Totem, launched in April, is a blockchain-based photo service which helps photographers protect themselves from copyright infringements. Totem is also the first application built on top of the XuperChain network. In May, Baidu Baike, China’s equivalent to Wikipedia, started to utilize blockchain to enhance the transparency and credibility of articles editing on its site.

In the Blockchain 3.0 era, Baidu aims to rely on blockchain to empower governments, enterprises and individuals, to apply blockchain solutions across many industries and to build a trustworthy blockchain ecosystem.