Nvidia, Microsoft, Meta warn against overregulating open-weight AI models

A coalition of 25 technology companies, including Nvidia, Microsoft, Meta, and Palantir, published an open letter on Friday calling on policymakers to refrain from imposing 'premature restrictions' on open-weight AI models. The letter argues that such regulations would 'stifle competition or drive innovation overseas.' Open-weight models can be downloaded, modified, and run on users' own infrastructure, and have become a flashpoint in debates over AI policy. The backdrop includes rising concern over Chinese open-weight models: Moonshot AI's recently released Kimi K3 outperformed leading American models on several industry benchmarks. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC on Tuesday that the Trump administration would examine whether Chinese companies were stealing American intellectual property and noted the government has 'the ability to sanction them.' The coalition's letter pushed back against hasty action, arguing open-weight models strengthen competition and ensure AI benefits are 'broadly shared rather than concentrated in a few hands.' The letter also cautioned that 'relying solely on closed models is not inherently safe: they can be breached, misused, or fail in ways that outsiders cannot detect.' Notably absent from the signatories were OpenAI and Anthropic, both companies that primarily develop proprietary closed models and are preparing for potentially large IPOs.