BLOG
The Coming AI SKU Migration in Enterprise Software
Enterprise software vendors are telling a remarkably similar story right now. AI is everywhere. AI is included. AI is the future of work.
But what enterprise buyers are actually experiencing is quite different. Yes, AI adoption is happening. But it is uneven, cautious, and highly dependent on data maturity, governance, and real use cases. Many organizations are piloting AI tools like Microsoft Copilot. Far fewer are deploying them broadly with confidence.
Vendors see that gap clearly. And history suggests they will not wait for adoption to catch up on its own.
This Is Not Just a Microsoft Story
Microsoft often gets singled out in conversations about AI licensing, largely because its moves are visible and its footprint is massive. But this is not a Microsoft-only strategy.
Most major enterprise software vendors are heading in the same direction. Salesforce, SAP, Oracle, ServiceNow, and others are all facing the same challenge. AI is strategically critical, but enterprise demand is not yet scaling fast enough to meet revenue expectations.
When that happens, vendors rarely retreat. They repackage. Which brings us to now. AI is quickly becoming a structural pricing lever across enterprise software, and IT buyers must prepare.
How Enterprise Software Vendors Monetize Change
There is a well-established playbook for how enterprise software vendors monetize shifts in product and business strategy.
Vendors tend to include baseline functionality to maintain relevance while monetizing depth, scale, and enterprise-grade use. Features that are “good enough” remain accessible. Capabilities that touch sensitive data, span systems, or drive automation and intelligence move behind paid entitlements.
Microsoft has done this for years. Power Apps works out of the box inside Microsoft 365. The moment those apps connect to enterprise systems or external platforms, licensing changes. Security and identity follow the same logic. Basic protection is expected. Advanced analytics, automation, and behavioral insights are monetized.
This playbook works perfectly with what’s happening with AI, and the execution is already underway.
What the AI SKU Shift Will Look Like
Most enterprise software vendors are unlikely to remove AI from existing products. That would create friction and backlash. Instead, AI will be embedded everywhere, especially in critical solution sets like security, identity, analytics, and integration services.
On paper, AI will appear to be included. In practice, the meaningful value will sit behind new SKUs, higher tiers, or expanded usage thresholds. The right to operationalize AI at scale, across systems, and with real business impact will cost more.
This is how AI quietly becomes a licensing event with waterfall impacts to budgets, SAM, and renewal readiness.
Why Standard Editions Will Feel Increasingly Thin
As AI becomes embedded across platforms, standard editions will not break. They will just feel limited.
Advanced insights will be capped. Automation will be constrained. Cross-platform intelligence will be partial. Vendors will position AI-enhanced tiers as the versions required for modern operations, stronger security postures, and competitive efficiency.
Price premiums of 30 to 50 percent will not be surprising, especially when AI is bundled into capabilities enterprises already consider mission critical. At that point, the decision is no longer about buying AI. It is about whether you can afford to stay on a SKU that assumes you do not have it.
The Pressure Comes Before AI Maturity
This is where enterprises get stuck. Many organizations will feel pressure to upgrade even if their AI strategy is still early, governance isn’t finalized, and usage is limited to a handful of teams.
The surrounding ecosystem will increasingly assume access to higher tiers. Security teams will want AI-driven detection. Identity teams will want predictive risk scoring. Application teams will want smarter integration and automation.
In other words, AI becomes less of a choice and more of an expectation.
What This Means for Renewals and Budget Planning
The net result is simple. Prices are going up. What is less clear is how much any individual organization will pay. That depends almost entirely on preparation.
Enterprises with strong licensing discipline, clear usage data, pricing benchmarks, and a grounded understanding of where AI actually delivers value will have leverage. They will be able to separate marketing narratives from operational requirements and avoid paying premiums for capabilities they are not ready to use.
Those without that preparation will find themselves reacting at renewal time, with limited options and little room to push back.
The Right Time to Act Is Before Renewal
The AI SKU migration will impact virtually every enterprise software renewal moving forward. Those buyers that want to prepare and build leverage must start early. If your deal is already on the table, you’re too late.
Conversations around clarity and value should be happening now, while there is still time to evaluate usage, test AI capabilities intentionally, and define where higher-tier SKUs are truly justified. That is how organizations avoid locking AI costs into their licensing baseline before AI is embedded into their operating model.
