Commercial transparency
What AI consulting actually costs
Published ranges for India and the United States, the variables that move them, and the line items that most proposals leave out. We would rather you arrive with a realistic number than discover it in week three.
- Basis
- Observed market pricing, 2026
- Our model
- Fixed fee, fixed duration
The bands
Ranges you can plan against
These are market observations, not a rate card. Our own fees sit inside these bands and are quoted as a single fixed number before you sign.
| Scope | India | United States | What it buys |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-serve readiness audit | Free | Free | Fifteen minutes, no call required |
| AI readiness diagnostic, 4 to 6 weeks | Rs 15 to 40 lakh | $75k to $200k | Scored baseline, roadmap, named owners |
| Prototype sprint, 2 to 3 weeks | Rs 8 to 20 lakh | $40k to $90k | One workflow, real data, a go or no-go |
| Production build, single workflow | Rs 40 lakh to 1.5 crore | $150k to $600k | Integrated, audited, handed over |
| Fractional Chief AI Officer, per month | Rs 6 to 15 lakh | $25k to $60k | Named senior ownership, not a retainer for advice |
Cost drivers
Five variables that move the number
Integration surface
One system of record with a modern API is a different project from three, one of which is a mainframe reached through a nightly file drop. This is usually the single largest cost driver.
Regulatory load
A workflow whose output faces a regulator carries evaluation, documentation, and challenge processes that an internal-only tool does not. Expect thirty to sixty percent on top.
Baseline maturity
If nobody measured the current process, part of the engagement is measuring it. Clients with instrumented workflows start further along and pay less.
Change surface
The cost of a system that changes how two hundred people work is mostly not in the software. Training, exception handling, and the transition period are real line items.
Ownership after handover
A client with an engineering team to inherit the system pays once. A client with nobody to hand it to pays again every year, whatever the initial quote said.
The hidden line items
What the quote usually excludes
The fully loaded cost of an AI system is rarely the build fee. Ask any firm, including us, to price these explicitly.
- Inference and token spend at production volume, not pilot volume.
- Evaluation maintenance: someone has to keep the test set current.
- Drift monitoring and periodic re-validation, especially in regulated paths.
- Exception handling by humans, which almost never goes to zero.
- Change management and training for the people whose work the system alters.
- Exit cost: what it takes to move off the vendor you are about to choose.
FAQ
Questions about cost
- What does AI consulting cost in India?
- A credible readiness diagnostic from a specialist firm typically runs between fifteen and forty lakh rupees for four to six weeks. Large global firms price the same scope two to four times higher, largely because of leverage models and overhead rather than a different deliverable.
- What does it cost in the United States?
- A comparable diagnostic runs roughly seventy-five thousand to two hundred thousand dollars. A production build of a single AI workflow usually lands between one hundred and fifty thousand and six hundred thousand dollars depending on integration surface and regulatory load.
- Why is there such a wide range?
- Three variables move the number more than anything else: the number of systems of record involved, the regulatory review the output must survive, and whether the client has a measured baseline. The model choice barely matters.
- What is the cheapest credible way to start?
- The NATIVE Audit is free and self-serve, and it produces a scored baseline you can act on without engaging anyone. If your budget is genuinely near zero, run it and act on the lowest pillar yourself.
Next step
Get a number before you write a business case
Bring the workflow and the systems it touches. We will give you a range on the call and a fixed fee in writing.