The $10 Billion Industry Built on Free Technology (And How They Did It)
WebRTC is free. Open source. Anyone can use it. No licensing fees, no royalties, nothing. Yet somehow, companies have built empires worth billions using it. Discord, Zoom, dozens of unicorns in telemedicine, ed-tech, and gaming—all leveraging free technology to create massive value.
I remember the first time I realized this: I was testing a small WebRTC project and thought, “This is free? Really?” And then I started seeing how entire business models were built on something that costs nothing.
Here’s the key insight: the technology itself isn’t the business. It’s the execution, the user experience, and the way companies package something free into a valuable product.
How billion-dollar businesses make free tech profitable
Take Discord, for example. They built a platform for gamers with voice, video, and text chat, using WebRTC for real-time communication. They didn’t reinvent the wheel, they used free tech. Users can make voice and video calls without paying, but they pay for Nitro subscriptions, custom emojis, and server boosts. The core real-time communication is free, the extra features are monetized.
Or consider Whereby, acquired for $200 million. Their whole product is a simple browser-based video meeting room. No downloads, no accounts at first, just a URL. WebRTC handles the hard part, they monetize simplicity and convenience.
Daily.co shows another model. Developers use their API to avoid implementing WebRTC themselves. They charge for abstraction, reliability, and time savings, even though the underlying tech is free. Telemedicine platforms, meanwhile, charge subscription fees to doctors for HIPAA-compliant video calls, while the core tech remains free.
The pattern is clear: free technology enables businesses, but the revenue comes from solving real problems, removing friction, and delivering trust. You give away the expensive part for free, and monetize the parts that scale easily or provide convenience.
Lessons for anyone building on free tech
Free tech isn’t a barrier, it’s a foundation. The competition isn’t about who has better WebRTC, it’s about who delivers better experiences. Focus on value, niche markets, integrations, reliability, and support. Reduce friction, make users’ lives easier, and they will pay for what actually matters.
WebRTC opened the door, but you still need to walk through it, build something people want, and figure out how to make money. The technology is free, the business is not.
Want to see how we use WebRTC? Check out NotesQR for file transfers.
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