Strategy
AI Business Case
An AI business case is a structured document that quantifies the expected value of an AI initiative, the full investment required, the risks, and the decision criteria for proceeding. A credible AI business case includes baseline metrics, realistic ROI timeline (typically 12–36 months), TCAI breakdown, governance plan, and success KPIs with measurement methodology.
Related terms
- AI ROI — AI ROI is the measurable business outcome (revenue, cost reduction, cycle time, error rate, customer satisfaction) attributable to an AI deployment, divided by the total cost of that deployment over a defined period — typically 12–36 months.
- Total Cost of AI — Total cost of AI (TCAI) is the full cost of an AI deployment over its operating lifetime, including inference fees, model fine-tuning, monitoring infrastructure, data pipeline maintenance, process redesign, training the human workforce, and vendor markup on top of underlying model costs.
- AI Strategy — An AI strategy is a written plan that identifies which workflows AI will replace or augment, what business outcomes that will produce, what investment is required, and what governance and risk controls apply.