Public Cloud vs. Private AI: The Complete Picture
Evaluate your AI infrastructure strategy on the criteria that truly matter: cost, predictability, sovereignty, and confidentiality.
Estimate Your Costs in 30 Seconds
Enter your team size to instantly compare costs: public cloud vs. dedicated infrastructure.
Heavy usage: CI/CD workflows, AI code review, automated testing, batch pipelines (~50M tokens/mo/person)
Cost Comparison
Public cloud
Claude Fable 5
€17,480 /mo
Private AI
1× GPU 80 GB (H100)
€4,025 /mo
Based on Qwen 2.5 72B deployed on 1 GPU 80 GB (H100) server(s), providing sufficient capacity for your 10 employees.
Monthly Savings
€13,455
Annual Savings (Projected)
€161,460
Break-Even Analysis: Cloud vs. Private AI
Beyond Cost: The Strategic Decision Matrix
Cost is a key factor, but for regulated or innovative organizations, the complete picture is essential.
| Public cloud | Private AI | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost Predictability | Variable: Per-token pricing is subject to change without notice. | Fixed: Predictable monthly cost for budget control, regardless of usage volume. |
| Data Sovereignty | Data is processed on third-party infrastructure, often outside your legal jurisdiction. | Data and models remain within your sovereign perimeter at all times. |
| Confidentiality | Sensitive prompts and data are processed by an external provider. | Full control: No external access to your data, prompts, or proprietary models. |
| Vendor Lock-in | Dependent on a single provider's pricing, quotas, availability, and terms. | Full independence over model selection, versioning, and capacity. |
| Regulatory Compliance | Requires a complex DPA; may not meet industry-specific certifications (e.g., HIPAA, GDPR, SecNumCloud). | Simplified: Data never leaves your own certified and audited infrastructure. |
| Operational Complexity | None: A fully managed service with no infrastructure to maintain. | Requires DevOps expertise for monitoring, maintenance, and upgrades. |
| Scalability | Elastic: Near-infinite capacity available on demand. | Planned: Scaling requires hardware procurement and capacity planning. |
Ready to Define an AI Strategy That Fits Your Constraints?
Regulatory requirements, data sensitivity, budget predictability—every organization has unique constraints. We design AI infrastructure that meets all your criteria, not just the price tag.
Book a Free AssessmentEstimates are based on public list prices and typical European GPU leasing rates. Actual costs may vary. This analysis does not constitute a quote.