Glossary

AI software that takes actions and completes tasks, not just answers questions.

AI that listens in the background, for example during a doctor's visit, and writes up the notes automatically.

What happened before a product or AI was in place, over a comparable period. Value is measured against it.

What an outcome was worth to the customer: revenue gained, costs avoided and other measured gains.

a newer company, or one from another market, trying to take business from the established players.

the computing power, mostly specialized chips in large data centers, that AI needs to run.

the organized business information an AI needs to act correctly, such as what counts as a "customer."

The distance between how fast the environment changes and how fast the enterprise can interpret that change, make decisions, align people and partners, move resources, and execute coherently. The core problem The Recursive Enterprise addresses.

a large building full of computers that trains and runs AI. It uses a lot of power and water.

the main software system for a business area or industry, such as the health-record system in a hospital.

A live model of what a product is worth to each customer: what every outcome cost, what it was worth, and how that compares to before, updated as the product runs.

the network of companies (suppliers, partners and rivals) that work around a major platform.

The practice of managing cloud and AI spend so cost lines up with business value.

The FinOps Open Cost and Usage Specification, an open standard that puts billing data from cloud, AI and software vendors in one common format.

an engineer from a technology company who works on site with a customer to get AI working in its business.

a large consulting firm, such as Accenture or Deloitte, that implements technology for big companies.

one of the giant cloud providers: Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.

an established company that already leads a market.

the "brain" of an AI system, such as the technology behind ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini.

a temporary ban; on this site, usually on building new data centers.

a newer cloud company built specifically to rent out AI computing power, such as CoreWeave.

Benefits realized minus total cost of ownership, measured against a baseline.

a shared map of what a company's data means and how it connects.

paying for results, such as each customer problem solved, instead of paying per user.

the business process from requesting a purchase to paying the supplier.

Net Value Realized divided by total cost of ownership. Above zero means the customer got back more than it paid.

paying a fixed fee for each person who uses the software.

Price minus unit cost to serve.

The unit AI models read and write, and the unit most AI usage is priced in.

Everything a customer spends to get an outcome: AI supplier prices plus other software, infrastructure and labor (people and agents).

What it costs a supplier to deliver one unit it sells: compute, models, hosting and support.

building software by describing what you want in plain language and letting AI write the code.

the sequence of steps people and systems follow to get a piece of work done.