The AI Tool You Pay For Runs on a Model Someone Else Can Switch Off: Run the 15-Minute Dependency Map
OpenAI is cutting off Cursor's model access on November 12 after a change of ownership. You probably do not use Cursor. The lesson applies to every AI tool on your invoice.
What happened. On August 29, OpenAI announced it will stop supplying its models to Cursor, the AI coding tool, after SpaceX acquired Cursor. The proposed shutoff date is November 12, 2026. OpenAI said it gave the maximum notice its contract allowed and that it could not be confident the new owner would operate within its terms of service. Cursor users who want to keep using GPT models can plug in their own OpenAI API key.
Why this matters to you. Almost every AI tool a small business pays for is a thin layer on top of a model from OpenAI, Anthropic, or Google. That means the company that can turn your tool off is one you never signed anything with. Here, a well-funded vendor got about 75 days. A smaller vendor with a smaller contract would get less, and might quietly swap to a weaker model to keep the lights on.
The move: a 15-minute dependency map. List every AI tool your business leans on: the chat widget, the notetaker, the proposal writer, the dispatcher's assistant. For each one, answer three questions.
- Which model is underneath? Check the vendor's pricing page, settings, or help docs. If you cannot tell, write "unknown." That is a finding.
- Can you bring your own key? Tools that let you plug in your own OpenAI or Anthropic key survive a vendor dispute. Tools that do not are fully exposed.
- What happens Monday if it goes dark? Name the manual fallback and who runs it.
Paste your list into Claude or ChatGPT with this:
Role: You are a small-business continuity advisor who understands how AI software is built.
Context: Here is the list of AI tools my company uses, what each one does for us, and what I know about the model underneath and whether I can use my own API key: [paste list].
Task: Build a dependency map. For each tool, state the underlying model provider (or "unknown"), the exposure level (high, medium, low) based on whether I can bring my own key and how central the tool is to daily work, and a one-line Monday fallback. Then rank the three tools I should ask a question of first, and write the exact question to send each vendor.
Format: A table, then the ranked list with the three vendor questions ready to paste into an email.
The payoff. You will find one or two tools that would stop your week cold and have no fallback. Sending a two-line question to those vendors now beats finding out with a 404 in November.