Are we a GPAI provider after fine-tuning
An organisation has fine-tuned or continued the training of a general-purpose AI model and asks whether it now holds the provider duties of Art. 53. Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 answers through Art. 3(63) and Art. 3(3); the published Commission guidelines on GPAI scope add an indicative compute-fraction criterion for the modifier. Where the criterion is met, the Art. 53 duties apply, limited to the modification, from the GPAI application date In force. This page gives the determination sequence, the records it leaves and the consequence of releasing without one.
Where this starts
The organisation took a general-purpose AI model under licence, ran a fine-tuning or continued-training job on its own data, and is preparing to release the result, either as weights or inside a product. The question of whether fine-tuning makes the organisation a provider of a new model is the first anxiety on the GPAI hub, and for a company that met the Act through a procurement questionnaire it decides whether the Art. 53 duties belong to the licensor or to the company. The Act frames the question in two definitions. Art. 3(63) defines a general-purpose AI model by significant generality, the capability to perform a wide range of distinct tasks, and integration into a variety of downstream systems. Art. 3(3) defines the provider as the natural or legal person that develops the model, or has it developed, and places it on the market under its own name or trademark. Neither definition names fine-tuning, so the base model's status and the modifier's status are both open until they are recorded.
The Commission guidelines on GPAI scopePublished fill that gap with criteria the guidelines themselves call indicative. For model status, section 2.1 of the guidelines gives a training-compute criterion of more than 10^23 floating point operations combined with a generality condition, the ability to generate language, text-to-image or text-to-video, and states that a model can fall on either side of that figure and still be, or not be, a general-purpose AI model on the generality test. For provider status after modification, section 3.2 of the guidelines treats the modifier as the provider of a new general-purpose AI model when the compute used for the modification is greater than one third of the training compute of the original model, and gives a substitute base where the original figure is unknown. Both figures are the guidelines' own, presented as rebuttable, and the Act sets none of them; recital 109 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 adds that the duties of a modifier are limited to the modification, for example by complementing the existing technical documentation with the changes and the new training data sources. No harmonised standard for general-purpose AI models is cited in the Official Journal as of the anchor date, so no presumption of conformity is available under Art. 53(4), and the GPAI Code of PracticePublished is the published route for demonstrating the Art. 53(1) duties, including through its Model Documentation Form.
A second role question sits next to the first and is decided under different articles. When the fine-tuned model is placed inside an AI system, the organisation is the provider of that system under Art. 3(3) and a downstream provider under Art. 3(68), whatever the answer on the model. Where the system is high-risk under Art. 6, Art. 25(1) turns a deployer, distributor or other third party into its provider on three triggers: its own name or trademark on the system, a substantial modification, or a change of intended purpose that makes the system high-risk. A modifier can therefore hold no Art. 53 duty on the model and still hold the full provider set on the system. The risk classifier runs the role and model routes on the published logic; PR-CLS v1.0 records every judgement the guidelines leave open as a technical assessment for discussion with counsel, and each obligation with its date sits on the Art. 53 obligation page.
The sequence
The work runs in the order below: model status, then the compute comparison, then the role on the system, then the exception and the duties, then the file.
Test the original model and the modified model against Art. 3(63) and the section 2.1 indicative criterion.
Record GPAI determination record for the original model and for the modified model
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 3(63); PR-CLS steps 19 to 20]
Calculate the training compute of the original model and of the modification run from the training records.
Record Training compute determination record: original compute, modification compute, approach and error margin
[Commission guidelines on GPAI scope, published, Annex A.2; PR-CLS steps 21 to 22]
Compare the modification compute with one third of the original, or with the substitute base, and record the result.
Record Provider determination record for a modified model: both figures, fraction, substitute base, result
[Commission guidelines on GPAI scope, published, section 3.2; PR-CLS step 27]
Compare the cumulative training compute with the Art. 51(2) presumption and record the classification outcome.
Record Systemic-risk classification record
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 51(2); PR-CLS step 23]
Determine the role held for the integrating system and check each Art. 25(1) trigger.
Record Role determination record for the AI system that integrates the model, with the Art. 25 trigger record
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 3(3), Art. 3(68) and Art. 25(1); PR-CLS steps 8 to 10]
Read the licence and retrieve the weights, architecture and usage information from the stated public locations.
Record Open-source exception assessment record: licence test, retrieval results, systemic-risk check
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 53(2); PR-CLS steps 28 to 30]
Compile the obligation register scoped to the modification, with the rationale for each open judgement.
Record Obligation register with the regulation entry id per date and the determination rationale record
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 53(1) and recital 109; PR-CLS steps 39 to 40]
Mark each Annex XI and XII row for the modification present, partial or absent, and compare the documents.
Record Annex XI and XII gap table for the modification and the cross-document consistency table
[Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, Art. 53(1)(a) and (b), Annex XI and Annex XII; PR-11-DOC steps 8, 11 and 36]
Write the determination report and deliver it with the register as one versioned evidence pack.
Record Classification and role determination report with the counsel note on each determination
[PR-CLS steps 42 to 44]
Evidence this situation ends with
| Artifact | Answers | Produced by |
|---|---|---|
| Provider determination record for a modified or fine-tuned model (PR-CLS output) | Art. 3(3) read with Art. 3(63): the original and modification compute figures, the fraction against the section 3.2 criterion of the published guidelines, and the resulting role | PR-CLS v1.0 |
| Training compute determination record (PR-CLS output) | Art. 51(2) and Annex XI Section 1 point 2(d): the compute figures, the estimation approach and the error margin behind the comparison | PR-CLS v1.0 |
| Role determination record (PR-CLS output) | Art. 3(3), Art. 3(68) and Art. 25(1): the role held for the integrating AI system and each trigger checked | PR-CLS v1.0 |
| Open-source exception assessment record (PR-CLS output) | Art. 53(2): the licence terms, the retrieval result for weights, architecture and usage information, and the systemic-risk check | PR-CLS v1.0 |
| Annex XI technical documentation for the modification (Annex XI Section 1) | Art. 53(1)(a) and recital 109: the changes made, the new training data sources and the evaluation results of the modified model | the provider |
| Annex XII downstream information pack (Art. 53(1)(b)) | Art. 53(1)(b): the capabilities, limitations, integration means and declared input and output limits of the modified model | the provider |
| Annex XI and XII completeness and consistency report (PR-11-DOC output) | Art. 53(1)(a) and (b): each Annex XI and XII row for the modification marked present, partial or absent, and the consistency across documents and the model card | PR-11-DOC v1.0 |
| Public training-content summary in the AI Office template (Art. 53(1)(d)) | Art. 53(1)(d): the content used for the modification run, in the template sections | the provider |
The determination records follow the assessment memo specification and the completeness report follows the findings register specification on the deliverables page, each with a synthetic sample; the Annex XI contribution and the Annex XII pack follow the evidence pack specification.
If nothing is done
A modified model released above the section 3.2 criterion of the published guidelines without a recorded determination leaves the Art. 53(1) duties unassigned: no Annex XI documentation of the modification for the AI Office under Art. 53(1)(a), no Annex XII information for downstream providers under Art. 53(1)(b), no copyright policy for the modification data under Art. 53(1)(c) and no training-content summary under Art. 53(1)(d). Enforcement for general-purpose AI models sits with the Commission: the AI Office can request the documentation under Art. 91, request measures under Art. 93, and impose a fine under Art. 101(1) for an infringement of Art. 53 or for incomplete or misleading information in reply to a request, from the enforcement date In force; the amount in a given case is set under the Art. 101(2) criteria. Where the integrating system is high-risk and an Art. 25(1) trigger is present, the market surveillance authority evaluates the system under Art. 79 and requires corrective action, withdrawal or recall under Art. 79(2). The action on the modifier's side is the sequence above: the two compute figures, the fraction and the role are recorded before release, and where the criterion is met the Annex XI and XII content for the modification is drawn up and kept up to date under Art. 53(1).
Services, guides and tools for this situation
The GPAI evaluation support service opens with the determinations under PR-CLS v1.0 and checks the Annex XI and XII content under PR-11-DOC v1.0, within the limits stated on what we cannot do: no legal opinion on provider status, and no statement of adherence to the Code of Practice on the provider's behalf.
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