Stripe Nears Deal to Buy AI Model Gateway OpenRouter for More Than $7 Bn

Stripe has finalised an agreement to acquire AI infrastructure startup OpenRouter for more than $7 billion, according to a Bloomberg report. The acquisition would give the payments company control of a platform that lets developers access and switch between hundreds of AI models.

The deal comes just months after OpenRouter raised $113 million in a Series B round that valued the company at about $1.3 billion. 

OpenRouter operates an AI gateway that provides access to more than 400 models through a single interface. Its platform lets developers and businesses choose models based on factors such as cost, performance and the requirements of a particular task, rather than relying on a single AI provider. Its model lineup includes systems from companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and xAI, as well as open-source models.

The startup was founded in 2023 and has grown rapidly as companies increasingly use multiple AI models instead of committing their workloads to one provider. 

OpenRouter said in May that it had eight million users globally and was processing about 100 trillion tokens a month. Its weekly token volume had increased fivefold in six months, from five trillion to 25 trillion.

OpenRouter’s business also fits closely with Stripe’s expansion beyond payments. The companies already have a commercial relationship. In April, OpenRouter announced an integration with Stripe Projects that allowed developers to create OpenRouter accounts, generate API keys and connect billing through Stripe’s command-line tools. The integration gives developers access to more than 400 AI models through a single API.

Stripe has been building its presence across AI infrastructure and the broader technology stack as AI companies generate increasing volumes of usage-based transactions. Acquiring OpenRouter would put Stripe closer to the point where developers select and pay for AI models, potentially giving it a larger role in the flow of AI inference spending.

OpenRouter’s growth has been fuelled by the proliferation of AI models and companies’ growing need to control inference costs. Its platform can route workloads towards different models, including lower-cost alternatives, allowing customers to avoid being locked into one model provider.

The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Stripe was considering buying OpenRouter for around $10 billion, while other technology companies had also shown interest. At the time, the talks were not final and could have attracted competing bids.

OpenRouter’s financial performance has also risen rapidly. The Information reported in July that the company was generating about $140 million in annualised revenue, up nearly threefold from April. 

The company’s API aggregates more than 400 proprietary and open-source models and frequently routes requests to closed-source providers, including Anthropic.

Rather than building its own foundation model, OpenRouter operates as an intermediary through which developers can access models from multiple companies.

For Stripe, the acquisition would extend its existing position as a payments layer into a part of the AI stack where model selection, usage tracking, routing and billing are becoming increasingly connected.