Two enterprise AI product agreements, earned over two years

The situation

BSC was moving from services-led delivery toward a product-led business, and our AI products needed their first enterprise customer. In regulated industries that customer does not buy on a demo. Its executives and its technical teams both have to believe the product will hold up, and that the people behind it will stand behind it.

What made it hard

At the start there was no agreement to sign, only a relationship to build. Trust had to be earned on two fronts at once: with the executives who own the business case and with the engineers who would have to run the product. I spent two years with both before there was a contract.

My role and the team’s

I owned the customer relationship and led the go-to-market work, partnering with our sales leadership on the commercial process. Our product and delivery teams did the building. My job was to keep the executive conversation and the technical conversation telling the same story.

The result

When the customer was ready, the relationship became a two-year agreement. A separate, larger three-year agreement followed, earned on the same executive and technical confidence.

Together, the two agreements represent more than $20 million in contracted value. Good technical work earned the trust, and the trust earned the chance to grow.

What I’d do differently

I’d define successful adoption with the customer earlier: what work the product would change, who would use it, and how we’d measure the benefit. That would give both teams a clearer view of the work required to turn the agreement into value.