Question

A retail company's leadership approved a gen AI customer-service assistant based on a pilot that only accounted for model inference (per-token) charges. Six months after launch, the finance team reports that the initiative is significantly over budget. Which overlooked cost category is the MOST likely primary driver of the shortfall, and should be built into future gen AI total-cost-of-ownership estimates?

Accepted Answer

The ongoing costs of data preparation, human review of outputs, monitoring, and periodic re-tuning that sustain the solution in production

Answer

The one-time cost of purchasing the foundation model outright from the vendor

Answer

The electricity cost of the end users' devices accessing the assistant

Answer

The marketing spend used to announce the assistant to customers