Executive brief
AI company diligence
Eight checks for diligence on an early-stage company that depends on a model: data, supplier, security, evidence, claims, rules and ownership.
Executive brief
Building an AI-native product
Six considerations that follow from putting a language model at the core of a product, and what each one settles
A founder who builds on a language model inherits questions that conventional software rarely raises: output that varies, instructions that can arrive from outside, actions taken wrongly and quality that ordinary tests do not settle.
This brief treats security, quality and law as one design problem. It asks of each decision what the model may do, who decides and how anyone would know it had gone wrong.
It reports what the National Institute of Standards and Technology, OWASP, the European Commission and two model vendors publish on six considerations, and it labels its own analysis as analysis.
One idea recurs. The model proposes and the surrounding code decides, because the sources describe no way to make a model immune to hostile text.
The brief names no preferred model, vendor or architecture, and it cannot say how any rule applies to your product.
It is general information for founders. It is not legal, tax or investment advice.
The brief at a glance
The chapters in reading order, and one public figure that frames the question the brief answers.
The chapters, as a constellation
Show the figures as a table
| Years since opening | All private industries | Information, including software |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 100% | 100% |
| 1 | 79.6% | 80.8% |
| 2 | 69.1% | 70% |
| 3 | 61.4% | 60.8% |
| 4 | 55.4% | 53.3% |
| 5 | 50.2% | 46.8% |
| 6 | 46.4% | 42.6% |
| 7 | 43.6% | 38.6% |
| 8 | 40.3% | 35.4% |
| 9 | 37.4% | 33% |
| 10 | 34.7% | 30% |
Establishments with at least one employee, opened in the year to March 2015. A closure is not always a failure: it includes sales and mergers. Information includes software publishing; it is not software alone.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Business Employment Dynamics, Table 7 , March 2025 release
These figures describe all new U.S. businesses, not WE's results.
- Format
- Written brief
- Updated
- October 10, 2026
- Sections
- 13
What the brief covers
The sections of the full brief, in order. WE sends the full text by email to the address you give.
- The question this brief answers
- About the evidence
- How to read the considerations
- Consideration one: what the product asks of the model
- Consideration two: managing the risk as a process
- Consideration three: how a model application is attacked
- Consideration four: how much the model may do
- Consideration five: knowing whether it works
- Consideration six: the law that may reach the product
- The considerations side by side
- Questions to ask before building
- What this brief cannot tell you
- Sources
Request the brief
This brief gives considerations for founders. It is not legal, tax or investment advice.
Start a readiness review
Tell WE where the company stands. WE replies to arrange a conversation and a written read of your company's timeline.
A short PDF of the charts and sources, sent by email to the address you give.
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