Thomson Reuters built its own AI model off Chinese tech to rely less on Claude
Thomson Reuters has launched an in-house AI model, Thomson-1, built by adapting Alibaba's open-source Qwen model. The company aims to reduce reliance on expensive third-party providers like Anthropic while maintaining specialized document review capabilities.
Why it matters
This move signals a growing trend of large corporations adopting open-source Chinese AI models to mitigate the high costs associated with proprietary Western AI services.
Thomson Reuters CEO Steve Hasker. John Lamparski/Getty Images for Advertising Week New York Thomson Reuters built Thomson-1 with a "realigned" version of Alibaba's Qwen3.5 model. Thomson-1 will save on costs, although it's not meant to replace Anthropic's Claude entirely. Companies are increasingly turning to open-source Chinese models as high AI prices bite. The Canadian data and legal giant Thomson Reuters wants to rely less on costly AI from Anthropic — and it turned to a Chinese open-source model to do it. Thomson Reuters launched its first AI model, Thomson-1, on Monday, and it's based on Snowdon, which was built by "realigning" an open-source Qwen model from the Chinese tech giant Alibaba, its chief technology officer Joel Hron said. Open-source means anyone can download the models for free and adjust them as they please.
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