A company buys software for ten employees: ten seats at thirty dollars each. Then it brings in one AI agent that does the work of five of them.
Next year, it needs five seats. The vendor’s software is doing more work than ever, and earning half as much.
The Arithmetic of the Squeeze
This publication’s own arithmetic: ten seats at thirty dollars is three hundred dollars, and five seats at thirty dollars is a hundred and fifty. The video gives no billing period for the thirty dollars.
The seat count fell by half, so the bill fell by half, even though the software now does more work.
At thirty dollars a seat, this publication’s own arithmetic puts the vendor’s revenue at $300 before and $150 after. The video gives no billing period.
What Usage-Based Pricing Is
So vendors change the meter. It is called usage-based pricing: you pay for how much you use, not for how many people have access.
Per Seat Versus Per Use
Per seat, the bill is easy to predict, but it follows headcount.
Per use, the bill follows the work, but it is harder to forecast.
Why It Matters
The video turns this into one question, and it is about the busiest month: what is the bill then?
Seats count people. Usage counts work. And agents work without a seat.
The Business Engineer framework maps where each part of the AI stack sits and who holds the leverage. These pills are short lessons from the same library.
Gennaro is the creator of FourWeekMBA, which reached about four million business people, comprising C-level executives, investors, analysts, product managers, and aspiring digital entrepreneurs in 2022 alone | He is also Director of Sales for a high-tech scaleup in the AI Industry | In 2012, Gennaro earned an International MBA with emphasis on Corporate Finance and Business Strategy.
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