Why does sqlite not suffer from the same risk?
Its an LLM comment, don't search too deeply for logical consistency
They have more sponsors/clients so a single company changing direction wouldn't kill them. They also sell directly if you want to buy from them. But ultimately the risk still exists.
SQLite doesn’t depend on donations. They have a consortium, sell licenses (it is open source but some companies like the explicit CYA), sell support contracts, sell an aviation-grade test harness, and sell extensions.
Of course there is always the risk it goes out of business like any other company, but it’s not funded like your typical small open source project and doesn’t even allow open contributions (not necessarily a bad thing IMO but it’s just a totally different type of project).