AI knowledge base: build, buy, or skip?
AI knowledge bases are everywhere in vendor pitches. Field notes on when to build, when to buy, and when to skip.
Recorded live at #AIWeekNY (May 10, 2026), co-hosted by Pulse NYC.
What's covered:
• Build vs buy (vs skip) for AI-powered knowledge bases
• Architectural study of vendor RAGs (Microsoft 365 Copilot and Glean)
• The trust problem: Copilot's accuracy NPS dropped to -19.8 by January 2026, and 44% of lapsed users cite "distrust of answers" as why they quit
• The ROI problem / Why build an AI knowledge base as opposed to undertaking other AI initiatives with hard measurable metrics
• Trust erosion through stale-corpus decay and algorithm aversion
• If you do build: what your MVP might look like + engineering lessons
• An MCP + router-agent architecture
• Extractive-Abstractive Spectrum + deterministic eval
Chapters:
00:00 Intro + audience makeup
01:24 What is an AI knowledge base (and who actually needs one)
01:38 Use cases across roles: IT, ops, PM, startup, enterprise
05:18 The ROI claims (and why most are vendor-commissioned)
07:34 Microsoft Copilot's adoption problem
12:41 Glean's architecture
19:48 Trends in the industry (hybrid intent, custom stack, role of vector DB)
23:48 Two narratives that didn't pan out (long-context, agentic memory)
26:34 The rollout and MVP problem
30:04 The "project brain" question & answer (MVP)
33:58 MCP + router architecture (MVP)
35:04 If you build: 8 engineering lessons that matter (+extractive-abstractive spectrum)
Resources and sources:
• Recon Analytics Copilot study: https://www.reconanalytics.com/ai-cho...
• VentureBeat retrieval rebuild: https://venturebeat.com/data/the-retr...
• Dietvorst, Simmons & Massey on algorithm aversion: https://marketing.wharton.upenn.edu/w...
• Glean / Forrester TEI: https://tei.forrester.com/go/Glean/wo...
• r/LocalLLaMA enterprise RAG thread: / 1ned2ai
About this channel:
AI in the wild.
Field notes for anyone working with and/or having fun with AI.
"Working with AI" = PMs, founders, execs, ops, marketers, recruiters, etc. (not just for engineers).
Topics include trend analysis, decision matrix, build vs buy, vendor evaluation, rollout problems, and AI strategy in general.
Solutions Architect at Accenture, Anthropic Certified, Principal at A19 Projects. Views are my own.
You can reach me via a19projects.com
Subscribe: / @jaeinthewild
#AIKnowledgeBase #BuildVsBuy #EnterpriseAI #RAG #MCP #Copilot #Glean #AIWeekNY