An OpenSea co-founder is rewriting AI’s rulebook?

Here’s a story about a guy who’s been around the block, made a splash, and now he’s back with a new hustle.

Alex Atallah, the co-founder of OpenSea, the NFT marketplace that once had everyone buzzing, is now steering a fresh ship called OpenRouter.

And guess what? He just raised a cool $40 million to turbocharge this AI infrastructure startup.

Aggregating the resources

This round was led by the heavy hitters, Andreessen Horowitz and Menlo Ventures, with Sequoia and some big-name angels throwing in their chips too.

The company’s now sitting pretty with a $500 million valuation . Not bad for a startup barely two years old. But what’s OpenRouter all about?

Picture this, the AI world is exploding, models popping up everywhere like weeds in a garden.

You got OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, all throwing their language models into the ring. Developers are drowning in choices, juggling multiple models to get the best bang for their buck.

OpenRouter steps in like the wise consigliere, aggregating access to hundreds of these LLMs and routing user requests to the right one based on cost, speed, accuracy, and privacy.

It’s like having one phone number that connects you to the best fixer in town, no matter the job.

Being the middlemen

Andreessen Horowitz’s Anjney Midha nailed it when he said, AI stacks are fragmenting, but OpenRouter is unifying them with one API, one contract, and industry-leading uptime.

This is the infrastructure play that’s literally shaping the future. This is it. Developers pay with credits to run their AI inferences, and OpenRouter takes a small cut. Simple. Elegant. Effective.

Atallah knows the pain firsthand. He says, inference costs are skyrocketing, and companies juggling four or more models are realizing that making LLMs work is no walk in the park.

Many tried building their own gateways but ended up frustrated.

Now, they’re turning to OpenRouter to handle the heavy lifting, freeing them to focus on what really matters, their core business.

Improvements

Since launching in 2023, OpenRouter has scaled like a rocket. Annualized inference spend jumped from $10 million in late 2024 to over $100 million now.

Over a million developers are tapping into its API, from scrappy startups to global giants.

Partnerships with Microsoft VSCode, Zapier, and Cloudflare? Check. Early access to cutting-edge models like GPT-4.1 thanks to close ties with OpenAI? Double check.

OpenAI’s Tabarak Khan gave props, saying OpenRouter’s developer community is diverse and active, providing pretty important feedback that helps improve the models. It’s a true collaboration, a dance between innovators pushing the envelope.