LOCAL VS. FRONTIER AI MODELS: WHAT SHOULD BUSINESSES ACTUALLY USE?

Businesses evaluating artificial intelligence are often pushed toward a false choice: use the most powerful frontier model available or run everything locally.

The actual decision is more complicated.

In Episode 2 of System Prompt, we compare local and frontier AI models through the realities of business use. We explore how privacy, cost, security, infrastructure, ownership, orchestration, and model quality shape which approach makes sense.

Frontier models may provide stronger general capabilities without requiring a business to purchase and maintain specialized hardware. Local models offer greater control over infrastructure and data, but that ownership also creates responsibility for deployment, maintenance, security, performance, and availability.

The conversation also examines why the model itself is only one part of an AI system. Prompts, retrieval, to