Bunq adopts Orq.ai router amid Europe AI sovereignty push - IT Brief UK
IT Brief UK reports bunq replaced in-house LLM routing with Orq.ai’s router, citing rising maintenance costs and gaps in observability, governance, and performance.
Published 2026-02-19Source: IT Brief UK
Why it matters
As stacks go multi-model, routing becomes a control plane for cost, compliance, and reliability. The article shows the router moving from plumbing to a first-class budget/governance tool.
Tokenmaxxing read
Tokenmaxxing at scale requires a policy layer: route by task, geography, and cost; log usage per team; and enforce spend envelopes. If you can’t attribute tokens, you can’t optimize them.
Source takeaway
bunq’s switch suggests enterprises are externalizing routing to get faster policy control, observability, and cost monitoring as AI usage grows.
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