Stripe to Buy OpenRouter for $7B
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
So I have shifted load away from calling some models to openrouter.
My thinking is businesses will want the ability to fire their provider and bring things on-prem if they want (but that they'd rather stick with a good provider as long as they're happy). Not so much that they'll do it, more that they'll want the option.
Flexibility isn't super important now as most routers are fungible, but as we move into an era dominated by open source models and fine tunes, that becomes a major impediment to switching. So building this now seems especially important. Especially if we guarantee data and model exports to customers.
A customer with fine tunes of open source models won't find it simple and easy to migrate. But we can build this escape hatch now before that story has a chance to evolve.
And of course there's a lot of add-ons that can be sprinkled on top later: handling customer data/outputs (videos, thumbnails, etc.), spinning up domains for products (eg. Three.js video game LLM outputs), etc. Vercel/Itch.io as a service, Vimeo as a service, media catalogue search as a service, etc. It'd be nice if this was all open source and portable.
Is anyone here interested in a closed beta of a Rust-based "Open" OpenRouter, Fal, (and eventually RunPod and Featherless)? We host it for you, but the entire stack is OSS and you can bring it on-prem if you want. I'd be happy to send invites. My email is "echelon at gmail".
We also do BYOK forwarding, so it's super simple to switch without even paying us. We even support router keys for double routing (OpenRouter and FAL keys in addition to OpenAI, Google, etc.)
Might need to rethink our Stripe payment processing. They have our customer book.
OpenRouter is good because of the market ecosystem play. I see this fragmenting similar to game distribution -- a handful of 3rd-party disti, 1 first-party disti, and some exclusivity/lockup/limited support outside of first party.
I am very interested to see how Stripe develops this. I would be happy to see a less-clunky top-up solution, for example, perhaps with micropayments. Not sure what else they are planning.
Recent overview: https://blog.cloudflare.com/ai-platform/
Payment processing for tokens - sounds like the thing Stripe does.
I do like being able to try eg GLM without having to set up a new account. It’s also nice that I don’t have to top up per-model accounts. I think I have a couple accounts with $7 in API credits sitting around.
Probably not something I would do for actual business processing, where the stability is dramatically more important than tinkering with new models.
Imagine if Stripe's end game is to control which producers of tokens become visible for a price aka middleman tax for tokens. If AI is as big a change as people claim honestly AWS should have bought openrouter instead.
But either way though 7B$ is just too rich no matter what, because the middleman tax is only worth it if you have a moat which OpenRouter doesn't.
All it takes is one of the bigger players to get serious and they will have a similar platform up and working in months if not weeks. (like Vercel & Cloudflare are already doing but even they are small compared to the true behemoths)
If hyperscalers start their own open routing service and cut off openrouter completely and become price competitive, I feel like they could wipe them out.
7B$ is just too much. Without enough of a big defensible moat. Especially since you can use a router in-front of openrouter and move users piece meal.
Can anyone explain what makes OpenRouter specifically worth 7B$ over everyone else? I say that as someone who has used a lot of similar services with similar results. Openrouter is better but only marginally.
Stripe/CF/Vercel are presumably not going to do foundational model development, so safe there. They are already platform plays to begin with, this strengthens that position.
Azure I am not sure how long they will be around doing MAI thinking models, I feel like they will pivot to smaller simpler enterprise only models. And given they already own npm and github openrouter might have made sense though I think they might buy huggingface, not that I want them to but it just feels like it.
Google IDK what google is doing exactly all my friends I knew in the AI teams are out a while ago, so maybe they are doing something really great we just don't know yet.
But I feel like it makes sense for hyperscalers since they can push their weight around a lot better than openrouter and can offer extra compute when providers are under crunch at higher prices to handle spikes. I think they are the only ones who can truly do fluid compute for GPU/AI in the short term(next couple of years).
Maybe after than we might have other big players in the space. Given the sheer scale of buildout I can almost guarantee we will see this pivot, otherwise there is too much hardware and token prices are too high.
Azure, GCP, I generally agree. The Neoclouds will drive prices into the basement, I think custom silicon/data moat/ease to deploy will be the hyperscaler's edge.
Even the suggestion of this absent an implementation hints at a future for tokens as a commodity. But it is interesting to think of it as some kind of new asset class, between commodity and currency.
I mean, we already think of tokens in the form of currency in crypto (e.g. NFT). There may be more than just similarity in the name choice when it comes to AI tokens. One could even think of things like "exchange rates", etc.
It's fun to see someone being able to exit so well without owning any model.
Of all the no moats they are the example of no moat. Its seconds switch to another router if even that is tolerated. And lets not even talk, the lack of compliance in an enterprise environment, and as they defer to providers on that...
But the acquisition makes a LOT of SENSE, if you realize that as the same VCs sit on Stripe, Anthropic, OpenAI and most important OpenRouter. Said VCs have a lot of interest in recovering their money...by pushing one of their companies to buy another one of their own, before LLMs providers financial pressures cut OpenRouter legs.
Is this stuff even legal? I will wait for Patrick Boyle video...
A middleman that adds compliance & regulation while skimming a slice off the top for themselves: You just described credit cards - stripe's core business...
You dont understand Bedrock fundamental use case.
It’s governed by your master AWS agreement (which will make your compliance officer happy), and billing is also conveniently handled by AWS.
Of course the Chinese models on it are rotten old and not cheap. But if you want to configure an app to use inference that is entirely controlled, it’s the next best thing to running local.
- Your inputs are within the security boundary of your AWS account or AWS accounts
Can OpenRouter say the same? - NO
Can OpenRouter say the same? - NO
Can OpenRouter say the same? - NO
"50.10.1. Subject to the limitations in this Section 50.10, AWS will defend you and your employees, officers, and directors against any third-party claim alleging that the Generative AI Output generated by an Indemnified Generative AI Service infringes or misappropriates that third party’s intellectual property rights, and will pay the amount of any adverse final judgment or settlement."
Can OpenRouter say the same? - NOFor those that hadn't read yet (on https://aws.amazon.com/service-terms/):
"Certain models" means "only AWS's own trained models" (Nova etc), so not e.g. Bedrock Claude or GPT.
"Certain limits" means they don't defent if the input to the model is the IP.
edit: Fixed the poor AM English.
(I switched to a major bank who offers much better pricing and integrates the Clover API.)
Are you sure that the value is in the wrapper and not rather in the fact that investors who invested into OpenRouter also invested into companies that can buy OpenRouter? ;-)
(see also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49330668 ).
I guess hardly anybody claims that. I think the suspicion is rather about whether there exist some other "puppetmasters" (e.g. venture capitalists) who pressured Stripe into buying OpenRouter.