Meta is releasing a commercial version of its open-source artificial intelligence model, Llama, the company said Tuesday, giving startups and other businesses a powerful free-of-charge alternative to pricey proprietary models sold by OpenAI and Google.
The new version of the model, called Llama 2, will be distributed by Microsoft through its Azure cloud service and will run on the Windows operating system, Meta said in a blog post, referring to Microsoft as "our preferred partner" for the release.
The model, which Meta previously provided only to select academics for research purposes, will also be made available via direct download and through Amazon Web Services, Hugging Face and other providers, according to the blog post and a separate Facebook post by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.