Meta isn’t just hosting AI events — it’s laying down a challenge. At its first-ever AI developer conference, LlamaCon, held in Menlo Park, California, Meta made one thing clear: it’s coming for OpenAI.
The headline announcement? Meta launched a new AI chatbot app and developer API built around its open Llama models. But beneath the surface, the goal goes deeper. This wasn’t just a tech rollout. It was a strategic move to undercut OpenAI’s dominance and grow Meta’s influence across the AI landscape.
The Meta AI app looks like a not-so-subtle preemptive strike. With a social feed for sharing AI chats and responses tailored to users’ Meta app activity, it feels like a direct counter to OpenAI’s rumored social AI platform. Meta isn’t waiting around — it’s trying to own the conversation before OpenAI gets there.
At the same time, the new Llama API takes aim at OpenAI’s developer business. Instead of relying on external cloud providers, developers can now plug into Llama models using a single line of code. It’s seamless, straightforward, and designed to draw developers away from closed systems. Meta wants to offer a full-stack AI experience — and it’s making that as frictionless as possible.
This aggressive positioning isn’t new. Internal documents from a legal case revealed Meta’s deep focus on surpassing GPT-4. In a 2024 letter, CEO Mark Zuckerberg even drew a sharp contrast, stating that Meta’s business doesn’t revolve around selling AI model access. That jab wasn’t subtle.
What’s striking is how Meta defines its allies. Onstage at LlamaCon, Zuckerberg made it clear: any AI lab releasing open models — from DeepSeek to Alibaba’s Qwen — is a partner in the mission to keep AI development open and flexible. For developers, this means more freedom to mix, match, and innovate.
As Zuckerberg explained, “Open source lets you combine the best of different models. Whether DeepSeek outperforms one task or Qwen shines in another, developers can stitch together top-performing elements and get exactly what they need. That’s how open source eventually outpaces closed systems — it becomes an unstoppable force.”
Notably, Meta didn’t launch a new model to rival OpenAI’s o3-mini — a move many AI insiders had anticipated. But maybe that was never the point. For Meta, winning the AI race isn’t about having the flashiest model. It’s about making sure no one company — especially OpenAI — controls the future of AI.
There’s also a regulatory incentive. Under the EU AI Act, “free and open source” AI providers may receive lighter oversight. Meta frequently claims its Llama models meet this bar, even though the claim is hotly debated. Still, if regulatory relief is on the table, Meta has every reason to double down on openness.
Ultimately, LlamaCon wasn’t just a developer showcase. It was Meta’s statement of intent — a declaration that the open AI movement isn’t going away. By pushing Llama and challenging proprietary players like OpenAI, Meta is trying to reshape the AI industry from the ground up — one open-source launch at a time.
