Riga on Monday a preview of a new feature has been released that could help AI startups (and other companies) solve the problem of passing on the underlying costs of using AI models to their customers.
Stripe’s feature, however, goes even further than just going through the cost of tokens. It allows startups to charge a markup percentage for token usage. So a company can, for example, automatically charge 30% above the cost of the coupons that the startup will pay to the model maker.
As Stripe described it, “Let’s say you’re building an AI app: you want a fixed 30% margin over the cost of the LLM raw token between providers. Billing automates the process.”
The billing feature allows the startup to choose the AI models it uses. Tracks the API values of these models. It then records customers’ token usage and automatically applies markup.
As we’ve mentioned before, there are several ways AI startups charge for their products. Many of them charge tiered monthly subscriptions that have usage rate caps. Once they are completed, the subscriber may be charged more for exceeding the limit.
For example, Cursor last year changed pricing on some of its tiers from unlimited usage to rate-limited usage, with extra charges for extra consumption.
Without a usage cap, users could run up big bills for a startup with model makers and force the startup to run in the red. This is particularly pronounced for representative start-ups. The more their customers use their agents, the more tokens they consume from the underlying model provider, be it OpenAI, Google Gemini, Anthropic or others – making pricing and business model decisions especially critical.
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Stripe also introduced its own AI portal, a tool that gives users access to multiple models, allowing them to choose the best one for the job. However, the billing tool also works with third-party gateways that are already popular, such as those offered by Vercel and OpenRouter, according to tweet from a Stripe product manager,
There are, of course, other startups offering AI model cost management capabilities with their own portals. OpenRouter, for examplewhich provides access to more than 300 models, charges a flat 5.5% markup on its first plan commissions and also offers budget controls.
Stripe doesn’t currently charge for its own markup on the gateway, its product manager told X. The feature, however, is still on a waitlist. Either way, if Stripe can help startups easily turn tracking and billing for these costs into a profit, it could be a game-changer. Stripe did not immediately respond to a request for comment on when the feature might be generally available.
