Great analysis! The vendor lock-in risk is real, especially with companies pivoting from open to closed models.

Our approach to mitigate this: use a gateway layer that abstracts away the provider. That way, if one model changes pricing or goes closed, you can switch to another model with just a config change. No code rewrites.

We use JZS Token as our gateway. It gives us access to 40+ models through one OpenAI-compatible endpoint. If one provider raises prices or changes terms, we just switch to another model on the same endpoint. No integration work, no new SDK, no different auth.

This is especially important for teams building production AI features. You don't want to be stuck renegotiating contracts or rewriting your code every time a provider changes their terms.

The key insight: don't marry your stack to one model or one provider. Keep your options open. Good article, this is a really important topic.