Mozilla's new CEO is doubling down on an AI future for Firefox
73 comments
·December 16, 2025no_wizard
dpoloncsak
The best part of Firefox, imo, is that its not just another chromium clone. Seems odd to try to copy the current trend, when they built such a base on being unique
jordanb
Mozilla is controlled by Google, they supply all the money and control the board. The board and executive suite are entirely SV VC types, no not-for-profit backgrounds, no free software backgrounds. Mozilla is controlled opposition for Google's monopoly.
Noaidi
> What I wish they would realize in the Mozilla C-Suite is that there is real appetite browsers that get out of people’s way and focus on productivity.
You cannot sell what cannot be seen. Business 101.
no_wizard
It can be seen though. Thats why I referred back to the Arc browser. People saw the real differences and it had fairly brisk adoption across a number of different type of folks, it didn't narrowly target technologists. Our designers, for example, at my last job, loved the heck out of it.
It was good enough for Atlassian to buy the whole company for a good chunk of cash too, if I recall correctly.
The abrupt ending of Arc's development has now left a hole in the market that Firefox could fill and gain marketshare.
Noaidi
You are a power user if you are using Arc. I know a few people who do not even really understand what a browser is.
Atlassian bought Arc to put AI in it by the way; "Welcoming The Browser Company to Atlassian Building the AI browser for knowledge workers"
https://www.atlassian.com/blog/announcements/atlassian-acqui...
jack_tripper
Sell what? What is Mozilla hoping to selling here? Firefox is free.
Zak
Their main revenue is sending search traffic to Google. I imagine a near-future source will be paid subscriptions to LLM products that integrate tightly with the browser.
Both of those require convincing people to use the browser, which is "selling" in the sense of persuasion even though there's no exchange of money at that point.
rrr_oh_man
Your data, presumably.
Noaidi
Sorry, you are all missing the point.
By "sell" I do not mena to make a profit, I mean, make it visible to the market.
If firefox did its job and got out of the way, who would notice Firefox? It is hard to sell something with no "bells and whistles". Do you think it is a mistake that Liquid Glass exists? No. LG is there so you notice you are on an iPhone which uses to just get out of the way but now is just in my way all the time.
Adding AI to Firefox is to make it visible in the market.
freedomben
First want to address the general hate/distrust Mozilla is getting. Based on their behavior the last many years, this is fair.
However, we've got a new CEO, and one from the Firefox side who openly talks about Firefox being the core focus for Mozilla. This is exactly what we've been asking for! I think we should give them a chance.
On the AI thing - I don't personally want AI in my browser. However, I do see some inevitability there, and I appreciate the stated approach:
> there’s still an AI Mode coming to Firefox next year, which Enzor-DeMeo says will offer users their choice of model and product, all in a browser they can understand and from a company they can trust.
If I can easily turn it off or point it at my own provider, this seems fine to me (maybe even good). I'm quite hesitant to let AI take any actions, but if there is sufficient user control/configurability then it could end up being a useful feature. If it's programmable through an API (such as with extensions) I could see some real personal use for that!
Let's not forget that Mozilla is one of the most important players in the open web. They made some big mistakes, but if they course correct and become what we need them to be, they could be one of the most important heroes of the time.
hysan
> However, we've got a new CEO, and one from the Firefox side who openly talks about Firefox being the core focus for Mozilla. This is exactly what we've been asking for! I think we should give them a chance.
You know the saying “fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”? Mozilla is well beyond a count of 2 for me and I assume everyone else who is generally pessimistic about every new plea for giving Firefox another chance. While I understand the angle you’re coming from, I think this argument will read as disrespectful to those who have given Firefox multiple chances.
Actions speak louder than words. I think that Mozilla has to make multiple moves in the right direction before this type of plea can be made.
rixthefox
Unfortunately this is not unexpected because Mozilla needs to continue receiving money to survive and unfortunately nobody wants to have the tough conversation about paying for a browser so when whoever is funneling money into Mozilla (Google) says you need AI in your product you have no choice but to jump.
I think their logic is a bit wrong here. Microsoft is a "trusted" entity. Trust doing a lot of heavy lifting here, and even they had to roll back their AI ambitions after seeing the lackluster adoption rates of people using their AI features. The trust part just doesn't matter. It's the principal that we've had browsers for over 20+ years and we never needed AI in our browsers. I would quickly abandon Firefox for an alternative in a heartbeat that doesn't include AI in it.
The uncomfortable truth for all these companies though is that most people simply do not need AI in the places they are shoving it into. Like why does notepad need AI?
rjbwork
I'm paying for my search engine now. I'd pay for Firefox if Mozilla wasn't a fucking clown car of an organization at the business level. I have a deep respect for the engineering team there, but the bean counters running the place should long ago have been ousted. It's the same cabal paying themselves exorbitant salaries and driving completely inane initiatives that nobody wants (see pocket, now AI). I'm not giving them a dime until they get their corporate shit together and I'll be disabling whatever crap they're shoving into Firefox.
rixthefox
Oh I agree 100%. I also play for my search engine so it's definitely not a lack of interest in doing so. I agree with your point as well. Get rid of the money vultures in the C-suite who are paying themselves exorbitant salaries and hand that money over to the Firefox devs. Give them the runway necessary to bring on more developers that would give Firefox the attention it needs to keep up with Chrome/Chromium and maybe start playing with the idea that if you want the latest updates when they release you pay for the browser. If you don't need immediate updates you'll get the deferred releases under a 1-2 month delay or whatever they deem fit with security fixes obviously being backported to keep those who refuse to pay happy enough to not abandon the browser entirely.
gbil
> At some point, though, Enzor-DeMeo will have to tend to Mozilla’s own business. “I do think we need revenue diversification away from Google,” he says, “but I don’t necessarily believe we need revenue diversification away from the browser.”
So they want to monetize the browser somehow outside of the Google deal. Future does't look good for Firefox
thayne
I really think they should look into B2B products with a strong synergy with the browser. Some example ideas:
- password manager with team and enterprise features that natively integrates with the built in firefox password manager
- hosted private addon store that gives employers more control over what plugins employees install, and can easily host internal addons
- enterprise grade "zero trust" solution with native browser support.
- related to the above, something like Mozilla VPN, but for connecting to a corporate network, possibly with split tunnel features.
Etc.
null
JoshTriplett
> And Enzor-DeMeo is convinced Mozilla can get there, that people want what the company is selling. “There is something to be said about, when I have a Mozilla product, I always know my data is in my control. I can turn the thing off, and they’re not going to do anything sketchy.
I used to think that, but they no longer have as much of that trust, and announcements like this are part of the reason.
ptx
This makes no sense.
Their AI solution is all about trust, he says, and we can trust Mozilla because they're not incentivized to push any particular provider. But all we're trusting them with is a frontend for other AI providers, which really doesn't help much since the backend provider also needs to be trusted.
But wait! Since Mozilla is trusted, they're also going to provide their own AI backend service. And they're going to do placement deals with AI providers. Which of course incentivizes them to favor their own services and their partners, which nullifies the CEO's stated basis for trusting them, which makes the whole thing pointless.
christophilus
Help me, Ladybird. You’re my only hope.
buster
That or the Kagi Browser... Waiting for a Linux release.
logicallee
out of curiosity, would you donate some of your GPU time as part of a distributed cloud of computers running AI to develop a browser?
My project ToyBrowser[1] got to the stage that it is able to render some very simple web pages and post on the Internet.
The size of the Internet standards for technologies is immense, but a million people contributing a few hours of GPU time might be enough to code it up if it is distributed in small and clear parts.
The result could be entirely in the public domain and people could have it do whatever they want. We are already collecting feature ideas here [2]
would you contribute a few hours of your gpu to make it a reality?
[1] https://medium.com/@rviragh/our-new-ai-generated-browser-bar...
devwastaken
Ladybird is a pet project of no relevance to the web. there is no tech advantage, its just as riddled with vulnerabilities. chromium and webkit are the winners. you need a whole new ecosystem to get something different.
tomovo
I think Ladybird is becoming more than that. It's actually helping set the web standard specifications straight in many cases and a from-scratch implementation will have its own advantages once it catches up. Which it will. There's no permanent winner as long as the standards are open.
JonChesterfield
Mozilla spend a lot of time telling me I trust them. I don't think that's having the effect they expect.
wkat4242
freedomben
Server timeout for me on that one. Got this one now as well: https://archive.ph/li0ig
jsheard
> “We’re not incentivized to push one model or the other,” he says.
Bold words from a browser whose finances hinge almost entirely around pushing one search engine over others.
skizm
Maybe this is a lever that they now have to finally break free of their total dependence on Google. Get someone like Meta to pay them to be the default AI model / interface.
marcusb
Yeah. “We’re not incentivized to push one model or the other,” may be a statement of current fact, not of values.
glenstein
Wow, to be honest I hadn't thought of it that way but that might be exactly what's on the horizon. Hard to survive on a search licensing deal in a world where LLMs threaten to eclipse search, but it may mean that LLMs want to compete to be in the browser space.
phantasmish
Multi-model or no, “AI in the browser” seems like one of those things destined to be eaten by “AI in the OS”, even more surely and to a greater degree than Dropbox was destined to be an OS feature. Having those same tools available system-wide covers the browser case while being far more useful and easier to use (because it’s one interface and set of behavior everywhere).
mghackerlady
Ladybird can't come faster
They’re not in a position to completely ignore some of the current AI trends. That much I can wrap my head around.
The seeming double down makes no sense to me. It won’t suddenly make Mozilla more popular. It could be useful, yes, however I doubt it’ll be radically different from other implementations of AI + Browser in such a way that it stands above the others.
What I wish they would realize in the Mozilla C-Suite is that there is real appetite browsers that get out of people’s way and focus on productivity. Given their small market share they could stand to grow by addressing that part of the market. Look at the previous success of Arc.
They keep chasing trends instead of creating them. And while it is a hard job to do that, I feel they haven’t given it an earnest attempt in some time
Firefox is still my daily browser of choice. I really want to see it do better and succeed