An AI vendor exit plan should identify what the business can export, what must be rebuilt and how a replacement will be evaluated. Cover prompts, source documents, labels, workflows, tool integrations and operating records. Using a familiar API does not by itself make the whole application portable.
Let’s plan your AI portability plan.
Bring your workflow and the decisions you need to make. We’ll help you clarify requirements, review the trade-offs and define a practical next step.
Inventory dependencies before selecting a provider
Separate your application assets from provider-managed features. Record ownership, export formats, access requirements and any contractual restrictions. Verify current terms with the responsible commercial and legal owners rather than assuming every stored object can be exported or reused.
For a hypothetical document assistant, source files may be portable while managed retrieval settings, conversation state and evaluation tooling require separate work. An exit estimate should identify those differences.
Create an exit register
| Asset | Question to answer | Practical check |
|---|---|---|
| Source material | Can authorised originals and metadata be retrieved? | Export a permitted sample |
| Prompts and tools | Are versions stored outside the provider console? | Reconstruct the configured workflow |
| Evaluation cases | Are labels and expected outcomes reusable? | Run them against an alternative |
| Derived indexes | Can they transfer, or must they be rebuilt? | Document rebuild inputs and effort |
| History | What retention and export rules apply? | Verify permitted fields and format |
| Operations | Which alerts and dashboards are provider-specific? | Recreate essential visibility |
| Access and deletion | How is service access ended responsibly? | Approved closure procedure |
Keep credentials outside ordinary export bundles. Access portability should not mean distributing production secrets in a handover folder.
Rehearse a small replacement
Choose a bounded task and reconstruct it using customer-controlled assets. Compare output quality, access behaviour, latency and cost. Record gaps instead of claiming full portability from one successful response.
Do not assume that switching models preserves tool behaviour or structured output. The model migration checklist covers the evaluation needed before traffic moves.
Plan continuity and retirement
Define the transition period, source-of-truth ownership and fallback if the replacement fails acceptance. Avoid dual-writing consequential actions without duplicate protection and explicit authority.
After an approved transition, review old integrations, service accounts, billing and retained data under the agreed process. Confirm what deletion evidence the provider actually supplies; do not claim independent verification without it.
Vendor exit questions
Does an open model eliminate vendor dependency?
Not entirely. Hosting, tooling, data pipelines and operations can still create dependencies.
Should portability be implemented in the first MVP?
Prioritise customer-controlled assets and clear dependency records early. The depth of a replacement rehearsal should match business consequence and available budget.
Bring the exit register to Drema's AI architecture discussion, alongside the private-data vendor questions.
