Open-source models offer new opportunities for Europe

Founder Christian Kroll said the change has improved performance while reducing costs by half. Ecosia, which supports environmental initiatives, is used by institutions, including Germany’s federal environment ministry and the UK’s National Health Service.

Ecosia is partnering with AI platform Melious, which provides access to models including Qwen, GLM and Kimi. Kroll believes open-source technology offers Europe opportunities to develop competitive AI services without spending billions on training new systems.

However, researchers have raised concerns about political bias in Chinese models, particularly subtle distortions that may be difficult to address through technical adjustments.