AI-first SaaS companies are reporting 52% gross margins, more than 20 points below the 75-85% range that built the SaaS valuation premium. The cause isn’t just market pressure. It’s an infrastructure decision being made by default.

Stop treating cloud cost optimization as a one-time project. This 90-day operating rhythm gives Eng, FinOps, and Finance teams a repeating cadence — monthly variance reviews with top-3 actions, quarterly contract renegotiations, workload right-placement, and cost guardrails — that cuts waste without slowing releases.