Architecture
The prototype path does not match the security, latency, scale, integration, or ownership requirements of production.
Founder-led production AI advisory
Your AI works. Is the system ready for production?
YakData helps teams find what is blocking production, make the hard system decisions, and move consequential AI work forward.
Where production AI goes wrong
The failure is often outside the model.
A prototype can look convincing while the operating system around it is still undefined. YakData gets to the decisions that determine whether the system can survive real use, then makes the evidence and next actions explicit.
Context and data
The model is blamed for errors that actually begin with missing context, weak retrieval, stale data, or undefined business semantics.
Evaluation
The team has demos and anecdotes, but no acceptance logic that proves the system is good enough for the decision it supports.
AI economics
The system works technically, but model choice, review cost, throughput, or engineering complexity makes the operating economics unattractive.
Operational risk
Failure modes, fallback behavior, monitoring, escalation, and human review are added late or left implicit.
Decision ownership
Everyone can describe the technology, but nobody owns the consequential business decision or the standard for releasing it.
Production judgment
Business consequence first. Then make the system work.
YakData is led by Stephen McDaniel, an enterprise analytics and software operator who has spent his career connecting business decisions to working software, data, and production systems through roles at Netflix, Tableau, SAS, Microsoft, and other organizations.
65% lower model costApproximately 98% of top-model performance retained after production optimization.
Enterprise operatorLeadership and product work across analytics, software, data, and business decision systems.
Faculty and invited lecturerINFORMS, American Marketing Association, TDWI, Princeton, Brown, UW, NC State, and University of Chicago.
Stephen looks at what the business needs and works back to the technology. This insight is invaluable for improving ROI and driving quick wins from the analytical investment.John LodmellCFO, Nordstrom Credit Services
How YakData engages
Start with the smallest engagement that can resolve the decision.
YakData gets to the governing problem quickly, exposes the evidence that is missing, and turns the decision into an executable next step with the right level of ownership.
Focused starting point$2,500
Private Analysis Review
For one consequential AI system question that needs independent diagnosis before the team commits more time, capital, or organizational credibility.
- Two 30-minute private sessions
- Pressure-test assumptions, evidence, risk, and alternatives
- Written findings and decision record
When the Review finds a concentrated problem$7,500
Private Working Day
A concentrated problem-solving engagement for a decision that needs deeper joint work, not eight hours of generic consulting.
- Focused on one defined system problem
- Architecture, evaluation, economics, or decision work
- Usually follows a Private Review
Offered when a Working Day is the right next step.
Deeper ownershipFrom $38,000
Private Engagements
For consequential AI work that needs an accountable senior operator through system definition, architecture, evaluation, implementation, production readiness, or handoff.
- Advisory or delivery ownership
- System-level problem definition and resolution
- Limited concurrent capacity
Selected Field Notes
See the decisions, evidence, and tradeoffs.
Each Field Note shows how a production AI problem is diagnosed, tested, resolved, and turned into a production decision.
Production system case
77 Rules: Make the AI earn the right to be trusted.
See how evidence, explicit rules, scoring, review, and ownership were separated so a probabilistic system could support a consequential operating decision.
Open the production case
AI economics
The 8X Engineer
A higher weekly rate can still produce a much cheaper project when role consolidation, AI leverage, and loop compression change the delivery system.
Open the Field Note and calculatorBring the hard system problem
What consequential AI decision does your team need to resolve?
Bring the architecture question, economics, evaluation problem, production risk, or unresolved system decision. YakData will get to the core issue and tell you whether the right next step is a conversation, a focused Review, or deeper ownership.
Discuss Your AI System
Start With a Private Review
One system. One consequential decision. Start with the smallest engagement that can resolve it.