An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Choosing an AI for Your Business

Picking the right AI platform for your business can be a daunting task. From AI-focused startups like OpenAI and Anthropic to established titans like Google and Microsoft, several companies are offering products that enable whole workforces to take advantage of advanced AI models. These tech firms say their business-focused platforms can make employees more efficient and decrease time spent on repetitive work, but how can you determine which platform best fits your company’s needs? We asked experts from the worlds of academia, business, and consulting to help figure it out. Here’s your step-by-step guide to getting started. First, think about your use case Arun Chandrasekaran, a Gartner vice president with a specialization in AI, says that before making any decisions regarding an AI solution for your business, you should think deeply about your use case. Consider if it requires a full SaaS application that can immediately be put to work or if it could be done with a customized AI model, which may take longer to create but could be more valuable. Chandrasekaran says that if you already have a unique AI use case that could potentially be a differentiating factor for your business, you might want to consider developing your own custom model, a process typically accomplished by using an API. Through this strategy, you can avoid paying pricey subscriptions, but will need to pay an API fee every time the custom platform is used. You could also utilize an open-source model like Meta’s Llama, which are technically free to use but require high-power GPUs to run locally. Olivier Toubia, a professor of business at Columbia Business School, suggests that entrepreneurs with a clear AI use case consider going for an industry-specific AI platform, like legal AI assistant Harvey or customer service platform Sanas, rather than one created by a major AI lab. These platforms come with tools and models designed to assist specific use cases, making them a worthwhile plug-and-play option. But, if you don’t have a laser-focused use case and are just looking for a toolkit for your employees to experiment and develop new workflows with AI, Chandrasekaran says an enterprise AI platform is the way to go. But there are several factors to consider when determining which platform is right for your business. Consider the data issues According to Chandrasekaran, understanding a vendor’s data policies should be among your top concerns. First, you need to know where the data used to train the vendor’s AI models was sourced from. A model that’s been indiscriminately trained on data found across the internet is going to be different from a model that’s specifically been trained on United States case law, for example. You also should confirm that the AI platform of your choice can connect to your major data sources. Popular consumer-level platforms like ChatGPT and Claude let users upload individual files in order to create customized chatbots, and their enterprise offerings enable businesses to directly connect their cloud-based data so employees can leverage them at any time. “If you’re using [AI] in customer service, you may want your AI to be integrated with your Salesforce data,” explains Chandrasekaran, “or if you’re using it for HR functions, you may want to plug it into your Workday system.” ChatGPT Team, for example, recently introduced a feature called “internal knowledge,” which enables administrators to connect their organizations’ shared Google Drives to the platform and quickly surface or analyze information. And Microsoft 365 Copilot naturally integrates well with organizations that make heavy use of Microsoft apps like SharePoint and Excel. Just make sure to confirm that your selected platform can actually connect to your data hubs. As of May 2025, only ChatGPT Team users have access to the internal knowledge feature, with enterprise access expected to be added later this summer. Plus, the feature can currently only connect to Google, not other cloud providers like SharePoint and Dropbox. Chandrasekaran says that organizations eager to connect their data sources to AI should check out Glean, a “work AI” platform sporting connections to “hundreds” of data sources, including Google, Microsoft, Slack, Box, and Dropbox. Be sure to ask about security and access A key question to ask vendors, according to Falk Gottlob, chief product officer of AI-powered translation platform Smartcat, is if content processed by the enterprise AI platform will be used to train new models. This is “table stakes,” says Gottlob, and if a vendor won’t commit to not training on your data, they may be a bad partner. BY BEN SHERRY @BENLUCASSHERRY