Alibaba's Qwen to End Free Ride: Reuters Reports Revenue-Sharing Model for Enterprises
teortaxesTex · x · 2026-08-07
Alibaba plans to ask major enterprise users of its Qwen 3.8-Max model for a share of their generated revenue starting next week, according to Reuters. This marks a shift away from the completely free model.
Commentators noted this is the right long-term move, arguing that open source does not mean free of charge. Since LLMs are incredibly costly to develop, sustainable revenue from commercial partners is essential to continue producing new open-weight models.
Related event: Alibaba to End Free Qwen Access and Charge Enterprise Users(4 posts)→
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