Nvidia CEO leads tech chiefs backing open-source AI

The letter from Nvidia's Jensen Huang represents a coordinated defense of open-source AI development at a moment when US government scrutiny is intensifying. The timing is deliberate: as the White House debates regulatory responses to Chinese AI advancement, major technology firms are staking a claim that open models serve US innovation and commerce rather than threaten them. The signatories—Meta, Microsoft, and Palantir—span cloud infrastructure, social platforms, and enterprise intelligence, suggesting that open-source AI has substantial backing among large-scale technology operators.

Yet the letter's most revealing aspect is who did not sign. Anthropic, a leading developer of closed AI models, stayed out, while OpenAI's later endorsement suggests internal deliberation within that company. These divisions underscore deeper disagreements about who controls the AI economy and how—whether through proprietary systems that companies control tightly or through open models that distribute control more widely. The rift suggests the industry is not aligned on this question, and regulatory bodies will face competing claims from credible voices on both sides.