SESSION OVERVIEW.
Traditional software costs virtually nothing per additional user, delivering 80–90% gross margins. Agentic AI completely breaks this rule, every query, API call, and agentic loop incurs real-world compute costs in GPUs and tokens, rendering traditional seat-based pricing obsolete.

WHY THIS TOPIC IS IMPORTANT FOR DEVFEST 2026.
At DevFest 2026, builders gather to learn how to ship cutting-edge AI. However, building powerful agentic loops is only half the battle; sustaining them financially is what keeps products alive. As software shifts from tools humans operate to autonomous agents that execute work, charging a flat fee per seat threatens product margins. This session bridges the gap between AI engineering and commercial viability, equipping developers and product leaders with a blueprint to build unit-economically sound AI applications.

TOPIC OVERVIEW & CASE STUDIES
Standard seat-based SaaS pricing was not built for the Agentic Era. As Agentic AI transforms software from passive tools into autonomous workers, variable inference costs and fluctuating usage require product teams to rethink how they capture value. Based on modern industry frameworks, this session explores the transition toward consumption, credit, and outcome-based pricing models. I will unpack how leading companies structure monetization for Agentic AI, featuring real-world case studies (Gemini, Antigravity, Google AI Studio, Google Stitch, and more), enterprise contract mechanics, real-time entitlement infrastructure, and best practices for executing transparent pricing migrations without compromising user trust.

WHAT ATTENDEES WILL GAIN
To be very specific, here is a breakdown of what attendees across different roles will gain from this session:
-Developers & Software Engineers: Learn how to design backend billing architectures for AI, including low-latency entitlement checks, real-time token/API event metering, and rate-limiting guardrails that prevent unexpected cost spikes.

-Founders & Entrepreneurs: Master unit economics for AI startups. Gain a clear roadmap to protect your gross margins, avoid underpricing compute overhead, and structure investor-friendly monetization models.

-Product Managers: Discover how to align product value with user intent. Learn how to transition from seat-based pricing to flexible credit systems, active agent work units, or outcome-based models that scale with value delivered.

-Product & UI/UX Designers: Understand how to design transparent usage dashboards, real-time credit meters, and friction-free overage warnings that build trust and prevent user "bill shock".

-Digital Marketers & Growth Leaders: Gain actionable strategies for positioning AI pricing tiers, crafting compelling value propositions around agentic output, and running pricing experiments without alienating existing users.

-Community Managers: Learn best practices for communicating pricing changes, navigating community feedback during migrations, and grandfathering early adopters to maintain high community sentiment.

-New Entrants in Tech: Receive a practical, jargon-free breakdown of how the modern AI tech stack actually generates revenue, giving you a strong competitive edge early in your career.

-Agentic AI Users & Builders: Understand how autonomous workflows, task decomposition, memory systems, and tool execution directly drive backend compute costs, and learn how to build efficient, economically viable agents.

This promises to be a highly practical and resourceful session that DevFest2026 attendees cannot afford to miss.
Thank you