// SERVICE — FREE
AI Readiness Assessment
Thirty minutes. Remote. Free. No pitch deck, no sales theater. A working session where we map your current stack, surface the two or three highest-ROI AI opportunities for your situation, and give you a written one-page summary. Most companies leave with a clearer picture of what to build first — even when the honest answer is "not yet."
What this is
The AI Readiness Assessment is a genuinely free, no-strings 30-minute working session with a senior engineer (usually Marc). We do one or two of these a week for organizations trying to figure out what AI can actually do for them. It's deliberately short, deliberately hands-on, and deliberately honest — including telling you when the answer is "don't hire us yet."
What it isn't
- Not a sales call. No deck. No pricing page walkthrough. No "let me connect you with our solutions architect."
- Not a feasibility promise. If your use case needs research that isn't yet done, we'll tell you that.
- Not a retainer trap. The output is a one-page written summary you keep, whether you ever hire us or not.
- Not an intake form. It's a working session. We start solving your actual problem in the first ten minutes.
What we cover in 30 minutes
01. Current-state stack review (10 min)
What tools, systems, and data do you already have? Where does information currently live? Who touches it? What's the shape of your tech debt? We're looking for the integration points where AI actually plugs in, not a generic "tell us about your business" intake.
02. Opportunity shortlist (15 min)
Based on what you just described, we identify the two or three highest-ROI AI interventions — ranked by realistic cost, time-to-value, and risk. Sometimes that's a RAG system on a document archive. Sometimes it's support-ticket automation. Sometimes it's "build nothing, your problem is a data problem, fix that first." The ranking is honest; we don't pad the list to look useful.
03. Data sovereignty and risk read (5 min)
Which of those opportunities have data-residency, compliance, or IP constraints that rule out cloud AI APIs? Which are fine for cloud? We flag this early because it changes the architecture and the budget.
What you get after
A written one-page summary within one business day. It contains:
- The two or three prioritized opportunities, with brief justification
- A rough order-of-magnitude cost and timeline for each
- The specific next action you can take (whether with us or not)
- Any data or infrastructure prerequisites you should address first
You keep the document. Share it, shred it, hand it to a competing vendor — we don't care. If the advice was useful, you'll remember who gave it to you.
Who this is for
- Operators at established companies trying to figure out where AI actually fits in their stack
- Founders evaluating whether AI is core to the product or a distraction
- IT and engineering leads building the business case for a first AI project
- Compliance and legal evaluating the data-governance implications of AI vendor proposals
Who this isn't for
Pure research projects, academic inquiries, "can I pick your brain about my startup idea" calls, and vendors hoping to sell us something. We're protective of the free slots; they exist to help people who are trying to build something real.
How to book
Use the form on our homepage or email [email protected] directly. One-business-day response. We'll propose a handful of times that week and get it on the calendar. Done via Zoom, Google Meet, or phone — whatever you prefer.
Frequently asked questions
Is this really free?
Yes. Thirty minutes, remote, no cost, no card on file. We do this because it's genuinely the best way to figure out whether we're a good fit for each other — and because a lot of the advice is useful even to people who never hire us. The cost to us is an hour (session + writeup). We absorb it.
What's the catch?
No catch, but here's the honest incentive alignment: the assessment is free because about one in three turns into a paid engagement — usually a $7.5K Deep Discovery or a $25K–$60K POC. The other two-thirds get a useful writeup and never hire us, and we're fine with that. The economics work because we only take engagements we're confident we can ship well.
Can we bring our whole team?
Up to four people. Past that it becomes a meeting, not a working session. If you need to include a larger group — exec team, compliance, architecture review — we'll propose Tier 02 Deep Discovery instead ($7.5K, 2 weeks, credited toward any subsequent build).
Do you sign an NDA first?
Yes, if you want one. Send your standard mutual NDA or use ours (ping for a copy). We keep whatever you share confidential regardless. For regulated-industry conversations (healthcare, finance, legal) we'll usually insist on one.
What happens if you tell us not to hire you?
Then you saved 30 minutes worth of your time and got a written recommendation for what to actually do instead. That's the entire value proposition. Some of the best writeups we've delivered ended with "don't build AI yet — fix your data pipeline first, then revisit in six months." Most of those companies came back.
Ready to start?
Book a free 30-minute AI Readiness Assessment. No pitch deck. No retainer ask. Just a working session to map your stack and surface the two or three highest-ROI AI interventions for your situation.