When to build vs. buy AI.

Every technical leader we talk to in 2026 is being asked the same question by their board: what is our AI strategy? The honest answer for most companies is short: we will adopt the AI that compounds our existing advantage and decline the rest. The harder question is which is which.

The default should be buy.

If a credible vendor sells a feature that does eighty percent of what your team would build, you buy. The build option is only better when the remaining twenty percent is the entire competitive moat — and most of the time it isn't. The cost of a model API is dropping faster than your team can ship.

Build when the workflow is the product.

The exception is when the AI is so tightly coupled to your specific workflow that no vendor will reach it without you giving them your data, your taxonomy, and your customers. In that case the integration cost is the moat, and you build. Everything else is a feature, not a strategy.

A short checklist.

Before you commit to a build: write down what changes in your customer's life when this works. If you can't answer in one sentence, you are not ready to build it. If you can, the next question is whether a vendor's product would change that life by even half as much. If yes, buy. If no, build — and be ready to maintain it for the next five years.