PRIVATE AI — VS CLOUD AI
Cloud AI providers charge per token, throttle at peak hours and may train on your data. Zanus AI is a private system you own and control — permanently. Here is the whole comparison, with the numbers on the table.
Every claim from published sources and list prices
The choice: their cloud and their meter, or your machine and your rules.
| Zanus AI — on-premises | Cloud AI (OpenAI, etc.) | |
|---|---|---|
| Data privacy | Data never leaves your building | Data sent to third-party servers |
| Token / usage fees | Zero — unlimited usage included | Per-token billing — costs explode |
| Performance at peak | Stable speed — runs on your LAN | Rate limits, latency, slowdowns |
| Internet required | No — works 100% offline | Yes — disconnection = work stops |
| Ownership | You own the system — no lock-in | Subscription rental — vendor controls |
| Model consistency | Your model, your rules — never changes | Provider updates break your agents |
| Context & memory | Built-in memory for all documents | Truncated at peak — hallucinations |
Cloud AI looks cheap on paper — until you add per-seat fees, per-token charges, consulting and years of recurring payments.
Full AI operating system, 15+ modules, unlimited users. $0 recurring — after 3 years, still $0/yr. Deployed Day 1.
Each AI feature an extra fee, unlimited overage. $180,000+/yr — $540,000+ after 3 years. 3–6 months to deploy.
1 agent = 1 task; basic coverage needs 10+. Seats + $50K–$200K dev per agent + token fees. $250K–$700K+ after 3 years. 2–8 months per agent.
Custom code — you own the bugs too. $200,000+ dev plus retainers and per-API-call fees. $600,000+ after 3 years. 6–18 months.
Buy GPUs, server and storage separately; hire AI engineers at $150K–$300K each; spend 6–18 months building and configuring; develop your own business applications; manage updates, security and scaling yourself — $500K–$2M+ and 1–2 years. Or: one purchase, complete system, 15+ modules, multiple LLMs pre-installed, support included — working in hours.
Significantly, at scale: per-seat SaaS with AI add-ons can run $60,000–$300,000 a year for a 50-person team — over half a million dollars in 3 years, owning nothing. Zanus is a one-time investment with zero recurring per-seat or per-token fees.
Prompts travel to their servers and — depending on terms — may be stored, logged or used to train future models. For contracts, financials, medical records and client data that is a compliance and liability risk. On Zanus, nothing ever leaves.
Published list prices and widely-reported buyer data, dated at review. Specs and prices change without notice — verify against the vendors’ current pages; ours are on the tiers page.
Or talk to an engineer: +1 (954) 736-3939 · Toll-free 866-8-ZANUS-AI
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