Sound familiar? Every company is being asked to build an AI intelligence layer.
By Trevorsumner · October 2, 2026 · Curated by George's Blog
Sound familiar? Every company is being asked to build an AI intelligence layer. IT teams are salivating at the opportunity to bring cool tech in house and reframe their centrist role. They have cursor. AI writes the code itself! But the data foundation just isn't there and if you have dependencies on numerous, dynamic external signals, you really need to question whether you will ever get there.
Every day I am floored by the level of effort and sophistication in i-Genie's data operation. At a surface level it's the master data management to understand every search, social post, video or review into signals about every brand, every product, every ingredient, every claim, every format, etc. Can you imagine that universe for even a single category like dairy, beverage, or skin care?
But that's surprisingly the simple stuff. NLP and model management that's rapidly evolving. Cost controls. Balancing new data with historical benchmarks.
And then of course, it's about building a usable, actionable and valuable platform. That is a challenge fit for the best product and design organizations. Do you see on time and on budget internal IT deliveries that drive high adoption for complex tasks?
Keep the ambitions, but be realistic with your foundation. This isn't the time to spend a ton of money on a high-risk strategy that stalls your competitiveness at such a key time.
And if you want to read some pointed insightful pieces on the topic and when it is right to follow your AI ambitions, check out the comments.