There are very few recently launched pure open source projects these days (most are at least running donation-ware models or funded by corporate backers), none in the AI space that I'm aware of.
Well the real open source project is llama.cpp which Ollama basically wrapped and made a nice interface on top of. Now they do more things as they want to be a real business, but llama.cpp is now doing most things people wanted from something like ollama, like serving a REST API compatible with OpenAPI, downloading and managing local LLMs… while remaining an actual open source project without VC money as far as I know.
This is a new umbrella project for llama.cpp and whisper.cpp. The author, Georgi Gerganov, also announced he’s forming a company for the project as he raised money from Nat Friedman (CEO GitHub) and Daniel Gross (ex-YC AI, ex-Apple ML).
