Efficiency that compounds.
The CFO-facing play. For AI leaders where the invoice is now measurable and the board is asking pointed questions. Framed by The Cost of More — a factory parable built on published reporting: the flagship that had everything except the price of one finished unit, and the rival that prices every layer of a valid cell and earned the margin to scale. Backed by Nucleus Research: 427% ROI on a marginal-cost basis, sourced.
A marginal-cost argument — every number sourced, every answer architectural.
AI ROI is not a POC-uplift question. It is a marginal-cost question. Every enterprise AI stack spends across six cost axes, and most of that spend is unattributed. This play turns that structural fact into a diagnostic — and hands the CFO office a defensible written ROI baseline in two hours, with every number traceable to Nucleus Research or a public reference.
The Cost of More parable
Interactive · in this pack. ~5-minute interactive read. A production line you can walk station by station, the cost anatomy of one valid cell across seven layers, and a reveal that maps the story to the model. EN + DE.
- Companion Talk Track Guide (4 sections · ~12 min base script)
- Companion Executor (3 CFO-adjacent personas)
- Companion Quick Start (3-min CFO briefer)
Where the invoice already exists
This play works where the AI invoice is large enough to be visible and the CFO office is actively looking at it.
- Named AI capex line item on the P&L ✓✓
- FinOps team in place (any maturity)
- Board-level question about AI ROIC
- 3+ named AI workloads in production or late POC
CFO · VP Infra · FinOps
Financial or infrastructure owner. Reads the invoice line. Owns the KPI. Answers to the board about marginal cost per useful outcome.
- Secondary: Head of Data Platform · Deal Desk
- Anti-signal: pure R&D shop with no P&L accountability
- Anti-signal: AI budget not yet its own line
Marginal-cost basis
Structural framework
Parable · Guide · Quick Start · Executor
Parable · Quick Start · Executor
Assets ship in the order the seller experiences the deal.
Same wave logic as the Sovereignty play. Sales-cycle-moment order, not dev-effort order. Wave 1 (Get in the room) is where we are — four artifacts shipped, two DE translations in flight. The model diagnostic (Wave 2) is where the biggest build sits.
Get in the room
CFO outreach · positioning · first-meeting framingFrame & diagnose
Interest → scored ROI baselineDesign & scope
Show the customer what "Optimized" looks likeJustify & defend
Survive procurement · deal desk · competitive TCOClose, expand, sustain
Scale · refresh · executor · routingSix artifacts. Field-usable today.
Six self-contained HTML files — no build step, no dependencies, each opens from a local folder. The parable opens the conversation and the model runs the diagnostic; the four sales assets around them carry the choreography. House-of-brand guardrails applied; naming compliant throughout.
Six cost axes. One denominator. Every axis attributed compounds — every month.
Every enterprise AI stack has the same six cost axes. Each maps to a persona reading a different invoice line. Every axis you attribute is one you can act on — every month, for the life of the workload. The Teradata answer works at every axis, under one denominator, with unit-based pricing you can defend to your board.
This isn't a marketing framework — it's a diagnostic. The parable is a story about two factories building the same cell — the flagship that could never say what one finished unit cost, and the winner that priced every layer of it, week by week, and earned the margin to scale. The AI Cost Model then does the pricing: cost per unit of work today, at the autonomous enterprise, and which axis decides whether the climb survives — every figure computed from the customer’s own invoice, not from ours.
The judgement vocabulary the parable ends on and the model carries: when, where, what, whether — the four questions about a unit of work. Transparency ends the guessing; these four are what actually move the number, and none of them takes work away.
📊 Approved proof points — every number sourced
These are the only ROI numbers to use in-field. Every one is analyst-grounded (Nucleus) or a public benchmark. The Talk Track and Executor enforce this discipline in-prompt.
Every sales-play slot with a wave assignment and a status.
Same 14-slot spine as Sovereignty. Extended from the mind-map's original 7 slots (A–G) to 14 (H–N) after the completeness pass. Every ROI number in-field must trace to slot K (Legal / ROI-claim disclaimers).
| Slot | Content | Status | Wave |
|---|---|---|---|
| A · High-level graphic | illustrated production line + six reveal pairswhy-the-cost-of-more.html · reusable in decks | ✅ Live | W1 |
| B · Differentiation | "One platform, six answers · one denominator · unit-based pricing"Talk Track Guide · the Teradata answer | ✅ Live | W1 |
| C · Proof point | Nucleus Research 427% ROI over 3 years, 11-month payback (July 2025, NASBA methodology) — reported in the model’s final tab only | ✅ Live | W2 |
| D · Concrete next steps | 2h AI ROI Baseline Workshop → per-workload baseline → compounding scenario | 🔴 Build | W3 |
| E · Mapping into AI Services | six cost axes ↔ Teradata Cloud · Factory · Fabric · AI Studio · Active/Elastic Compute · in-DBCapability-Gap-Analysis (293-node model) | ✅ Live | W3 |
| F · Industry-specific touch | FS · Telco · Retail · Manufacturing · Insurance · Auto | 🟡 Adapt | W3 |
| G · Feedback loop into R&D | ROI baseline deltas → PM · FinOps signal — channel undefined | 🔴 Build | W5 |
| H · Objection handling library | Top-10 (POC-first · already on hyperscaler · consumption fear · migration cost · Nucleus challenge) | 🔴 Build | W4 |
| I · Competitive positioning | vs Snowflake · Databricks · Pinecone · hyperscaler-native TCOKPC 2026 · Cost Calculator · Vector Store BoF | 🟡 Adapt | W4 |
| J · Discovery question set | 15–20 Qs — cost-signal listening (invoice line ownership · marginal-cost question · POC vs prod) | 🔴 Build | W4 |
| K · Legal / ROI-claim disclaimers | Every ROI claim sourceable · Nucleus attribution rules · anti-fabrication rules | 🔴 Build | W4 |
| L · Localization plan | EN + DE at W1–W2 · FR + ES at W5 | 🔴 Build | W5 |
| M · Metrics & telemetry | Landing-page visits · workshop bookings · CFO meetings sourced · Business Value Calculator handoffs | 🔴 Build | W5 |
| N · Lifecycle & refresh cadence | Nucleus refresh annually · comp row monthly · cost/query numbers quarterly | 🔴 Build | W5 |
The play in Revenue Enablement's native format.
How AI ROI maps to Teradata's canonical sales-play template (Quick Start → Phase 1 What to Know → Phase 2 What to Say → Phase 3 What to Do → Phase 4 Manager Enablement). This is how Dan Carr's team will accept it into Seismic.
Quick Start
ICP: CFO / VP Infra / FinOps with visible AI invoice and board-level ROIC question.
What to Know
six cost axes + the model’s computed outputs. Vendor evidence appears in the final tab only.
What to Say
The Cost of More parable + Talk Track (EN + DE) + CFO outreach templates.
What to Do
ROI diagnostic (model) → baseline capture → workload replay → BVC handoff.
Manager Enablement
Co-sell with CFO office + FinOps + coaching frameworks for cost-conversion.
Ordered by when in the deal cycle — not by dev effort.
Every item unlocks a moment the seller must win. Waves 1 items are shipping this quarter. The model is built and bundled; Waves 2–3 deepen it and add the BVC bridge. Waves 4–5 are the defense and sustain infrastructure.
Get in the room · 4 shipped · 2 in flight
- ✅ The Cost of More parable EN/DE — illustrated production line, the instrument on-stage, six reveal pairs, no asserted figures.Live
- ✅ Talk Track EN — 5-section presenter script with ROI-claim discipline block.Live
- ✅ Quick Start 1-pager — A4 landscape · 4 Nucleus proof cells · CFO-forwardable.Live
- ✅ ROI Executor (executor.html) — CFO · VP Infra · FinOps personas.Live
- 🟡 Talk Track DE — translation from finalized EN.~2d
- 🟡 Executor DE prompts — parallel variant.~2d
Frame & diagnose · model deepening
- 🔴 ROI diagnostic (the model) — six-axis framework + baseline capture + compounding scenario.~2 dev-weeks
- 🔴 Nucleus reference-mapping engine — customer inputs map to closest Nucleus reference case.~1 week
Design & scope · workshop-ready
- 🔴 Target-State Architecture designer — Teradata Cloud + Factory + Fabric consumption model.~1 week
- 🔴 Consumption-model designer — Active Compute + Elastic Compute scenario.~1 week
- 🔴 Business Value Calculator bridge — teradata.com/business-value-calculator integration.~3d
- 🔴 AI ROI Baseline Workshop template — 30m baseline + 60m mapping + 30m compounding.~1 week
- 🟡 Industry payloads — FS · Telco · Retail · Manufacturing · Insurance · Auto.~1w / industry
Justify & defend
- 🟡 Competitive TCO row — vs Snowflake · Databricks · Pinecone · hyperscaler-native.~1 week
- 🔴 Discovery question set — cost-signal listening (15–20 Qs).~3d
- 🔴 Objection handling library — top-10 (POC-first · Nucleus challenge · migration cost).~4d
- 🔴 Legal / ROI-claim disclaimers — Nucleus sourcing rules, anti-fabrication guardrails.~3d
- 🔴 Manager coaching framework — CFO / VP Infra conversation red flags.~1 week
Close, expand, sustain
- 🔴 Deal-desk packaging — ROI (platform + FinOps engagement) commercial shape.~1 week
- 🔴 Metrics & telemetry v1 — workshop bookings · BVC handoffs · CFO-meetings sourced.~1 week
- 🔴 Refresh cadence — Nucleus annual · comp row monthly · cost/query numbers quarterly.~3d
- 🔴 FDE feedback loop — ROI baselines → PM · FinOps signal channel.~1 week
- 🔴 Partner co-sell wiring — FinOps consultancies · CFO-office advisory.~2 weeks
- 🔴 Executor +6 personas — Head of Data Platform · CPO · Deal Desk Lead (extends to 9 total).~1 week
- 🔴 Cross-play routing rules — ROI → Strategy · ROI → Sovereignty.~3d
- 🔴 FR / ES localization.~1w / lang
Six artifacts. One coherent Wave 1 pack. Ready for LT and Sales to react to.
Open any of the four sibling assets to see the play in the seller's hands. Or forward this landing page to your reviewers as the strawman — every ROI number sourced, every axis architecturally addressable.