AI Is Getting Smarter, But Can We Still Afford It?

Why your AI startup might be profitable on paper, and dead in the water by next year.

Imagine paying 10x more for something that used to cost pocket change.

Not because of a scam, but because AI got a whole lot smarter

That’s exactly where we are right now.

Just a year ago, using AI felt manageable. You paid per “token” — tiny chunks of text in and out — and the costs? Predictable. Clean. Linear.

But that predictability is gone.

We’ve now entered the era of reasoning models and agentic AI. These systems don’t just respond, they pause, evaluate, and problem-solve. They think before they speak.

And that thinking? Comes with a serious price tag.

“The cost of compute has gone from fixed to wildly variable. No one really knows how to charge for it anymore.”

— RK Anand, Co-founder of Recogni

That line hit me hard.

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In today’s paid edition, we’re unpacking what most founders overlook and what you can do right now to stay ahead:

1. The biggest mistake founders make when pricing AI (and how to fix it)

2. How your traction might be hiding unsustainable costs

3. What agentic models actually mean for your margins

4. Four brutally clear questions to bulletproof your monetization strategy

This is just the surface. To go deeper and get the full playbook, unlock the full post by becoming a paid subscriber.

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