Priced by the shape of the engagement. Quoted in writing.
Airtool is licensed on two surfaces — the Apps suite and the Platform — under two deployment models, SaaS and on-premises. The units are simple : application users on the Apps, application users and developers on the Platform. Every capability of the runtime is included on every engagement ; there is no plan ladder and no premium edition. The number depends on the shape of the deployment, so it is produced by a commercial architect and delivered as a written quote you can take to procurement — licence, implementation phases and support tier itemised, within two business days.
Two units, no feature gates
Apps are licensed per application user. The Platform is licensed per application user and per developer. Supervised execution, multi-engine SQL, analytics, AI inside the perimeter, audit and observability are properties of the runtime that every engagement inherits — not features unlocked at a higher tier.
Two deployment models
SaaS, hosted on AWS and operated by the platform team. On-premises, on customer infrastructure, operated by the customer's team. The same runtime, the same capabilities ; the difference is who operates the infrastructure, and the licence reflects it.
Subscription with survival rights
On-premises is an annual subscription. It buys updates, AI features, support and monitoring. If it lapses, the deployed runtime keeps running on customer infrastructure indefinitely — your applications, your users, your integrations.
A written quote, not a checkout
Describe the engagement — surface, users, developers, deployment model, environments, regions, timeline — and a commercial architect returns an itemised quote within two business days. Volume, term length, regional and AI-scope adjustments are in the quote, not in a marketing table.
Four applications, licensed per user.
ERP on its own for the customers who need the operational backbone. CRM, HR or Project Management on their own when the engagement is single-purpose. The full suite for customers running more than one module, licensed below the sum of its parts. On SaaS the Apps are hosted and operated by the platform team ; on-premises customers license the Platform and receive the Apps as source-available reference architecture they can read, fork and extend.
CRM · HR · Project Management
Any single application
- CRM — pipeline, accounts, support, revenue analytics, AI intelligence
- HR — employee records, time and attendance, recruitment, performance
- Project Management — planning, tasks, resources, budget and cost, reporting
- The same platform, audit trail, multi-entity and multi-currency as ERP
- Move to the full suite when a second module joins — a licence change, not a migration
ERP
The operational backbone
- Financial management, sales and customer management, procurement and suppliers, inventory and supply chain, manufacturing, reporting and analytics
- Multi-entity, multi-currency, audit trail and period close built in
- Native fiscal coverage for the regimes the suite supports
The full suite
ERP, CRM, HR and Project Management
- All four applications on one runtime, one data model, one security perimeter
- Source-available licence — the suite is a working starter and a reference architecture to extend on the Platform
- Licensed below the sum of the four standalone applications
- The natural shape for an engagement running ERP plus a second module
Start from an Apps suite. Build out from there.
The Apps and the Platform are not either-or. The most common enterprise engagement licenses an Apps suite — ERP, or the full suite — as a working starter and adds the Platform on top : a custom module on the same data model, a vertical workflow on top of procurement, a buyer portal that shares the customer master with CRM. The source-available licence on the Apps means the suite is also a reference architecture the customer's team can read, fork and extend.
Because every capability the Apps inherit — supervised execution, multi-tenancy, audit, observability, AI inside the perimeter — is the platform's, custom modules inherit them automatically. No integration tax, no second security perimeter, no parallel observability tier. The custom code lives in the same metadata repository the suite lives in, and the quote for the combined engagement is one document.
For teams building their own applications on Airtool.
Two units — application users for the human-facing surface, developers for the team that authors, administers and operates. Every capability is included on every engagement : supervised execution, multi-engine SQL, analytics, AI inside the perimeter, audit, observability. No per-engine licensing, no per-module surcharge, no premium edition. A Platform engagement needs a viable user fleet and at least two developers ; the quote reflects the number of each, the deployment model and the environments in scope.
Application user
A user of any application your team built on the platform
- Run every application your team has deployed — no per-application limit, no per-module surcharge
- Native SQL across all ten supported engines and interactive analytics — dashboards, drill-down, drill-across, cross-filtering — inside every application
- AI business agents that work in natural language on the data the user's role can already read, inside the user's permission perimeter, every call audited
- Authentication, audit, observability and document generation included
Platform developer
An engineer authoring on the platform — build, administer, operate
- Everything in the application-user tier, plus the full build, administer and operate surface — the same platform, no premium edition
- Build — the Application Editor with 114 components for forms, dashboards, reports, server scripts and batch jobs, hot-reloaded across the cluster
- Code — server-side JavaScript, Python, Groovy and a business 4GL ; the native SQL compiler across all ten engines ; the 40+ namespace standard library
- AI development agents that author the same metadata graph developers do — behind the approval gate, under the developer's own permissions
- Administer — Studio : users, roles, authentication, the key vault, scheduled tasks, replica routing, AI providers and ceilings, the audit
- On-premises : the Apps suite included as source-available reference architecture
On-premises · the enterprise application operating system.
Airtool on-premises is the operating system layer for the applications the business runs on — the same supervised runtime, the same ten database engines, the same AI inside the perimeter as the hosted service — deployed on customer infrastructure and operated by the customer's team. Production runs on a two-node high-availability cluster at minimum ; non-production environments share nodes because the runtime is multi-tenant by design ; adding capacity is a node boot and a role assignment.
On-premises engagements are licensed under an annual subscription with survival rights. The subscription buys software updates, AI features, support and monitoring. If it is not renewed, the deployed runtime continues to run on customer infrastructure indefinitely — applications keep serving users, integrations keep firing, batch jobs keep running. This is the licence model HashiCorp, GitLab and Confluent ship enterprise infrastructure under, and the shape procurement teams expect on strategic infrastructure the business will depend on for a decade or more.
Survival rights — what continues, what the subscription buys.
| What continues — indefinitely, if the subscription lapses | What the active subscription buys | |
|---|---|---|
| The deployed runtime | Continues running on customer infrastructure — no licence-check phone-home, no time-bomb, no remote kill-switch | ✓ SLA-bound issue resolution from the platform engineering team |
| Every application your team built | Keeps serving users on the version that was running when the subscription lapsed | ✓ Expert advisory for architecture review and production-grade guidance |
| Every user already authenticated | Keeps their access, their roles, their data perimeter | ✓ Runtime, Studio and standard library — features and performance improvements |
| Every integration and batch job | Keeps firing on schedule, against the engines and endpoints already configured | ✓ CVE response, dependency upgrades and security advisories on the subscription cadence |
| The Apps source you hold | Yours under the source-available licence — read, fork, extend on your own copy | ✓ AI and MCP services that depend on the platform team's cloud. Without the subscription they stop ; the platform's core does not |
| Your data, on your storage | Always was yours ; on-premises deployment makes it explicit |
How the licence compares in shape — not in price
| Tier-1 ERP vendor | Visual application builder | Airtool | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Licence structure | Bundled inside a corporate agreement ; components and metrics negotiated case by case | Per user, per application, per environment ; consumption metered | ✓ Two units — application users and developers — on two deployment models ; itemised in a written quote |
| Capability gating | Editions and add-ons ; capabilities unlocked at higher tiers | Tiers by feature ; enterprise capabilities at the top tier | ✓ None ; every capability of the runtime on every engagement |
| What happens when it lapses | Right to use ends ; continued operation is a contractual question | Applications stop ; output is vendor-locked | ✓ On-premises, the deployed runtime keeps running ; updates, AI services and support stop |
| Source | Closed | Closed | ✓ Apps source-available ; the platform's metadata is the customer's |
What the quote covers
The licence is one part. The quote also itemises the implementation phases — assessment, design, build, cut-over, hypercare — and the support tier, so that the total cost of the engagement is visible in one document rather than discovered in stages. Volume, term length, regional and AI-scope adjustments are in the quote, where they can be explained, not in a marketing table where they cannot.
For ongoing customers, commercial changes — additional users, developers, environments or modules — are handled through the account contact documented in the engagement.
What buyers ask before the commercial conversation.
Why is there no rate card on this page?
Because an enterprise engagement is priced by its shape — users, developers, deployment model, environments, regions, AI scope, support tier — and a single figure cannot carry that honestly. The model is public : two surfaces, two units, two deployment models, every capability included, survival rights on-premises, AI tokens at provider rates. The number is produced by a commercial architect and delivered as a written, itemised quote within two business days.
Why are there no Starter, Growth or Enterprise tiers?
Because tiered plans hide pricing rather than communicate it. Supervised execution, multi-tenancy, audit, observability and AI inside the perimeter are properties of the runtime that every engagement inherits ; they are not features to unlock. One licence per surface, with adjustments in the quote, is the honest expression of how the business is priced.
What does the Platform licence include that the Apps licence does not?
The Platform licence is what a team needs to author its own applications on Airtool — the Application Editor, the standard library, the AI development agents, Studio and the full build, administer and operate toolchain. The Apps licence covers running the packaged ERP, CRM, HR and Project Management applications. Customers who start on the Apps and add the Platform later license both, in one quote.
What does an Airtool deployment look like, physically?
Production runs on a two-node high-availability cluster at minimum. Non-production environments — DEV, QA, TEST, staging — typically share a node, because the runtime is multi-tenant by design and the environment context isolates them. A small footprint is two production nodes plus one shared non-production node ; a larger one adds a dedicated development node and a batch worker ; an enterprise deployment scales horizontally by booting more application nodes, each reading its role from configuration and joining the cluster.
Can we run the Platform without developers?
A Platform engagement needs at least two developers ; a platform with one developer has no review surface. Organisations that only need to run the packaged applications are served by the Apps licence.
Are AI provider tokens included in the licence?
No. Tokens are billed by the provider you choose — OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Vertex, IBM watsonx, Cohere, or none at all with models on your own infrastructure — at the provider's own rates, with no markup. The abstraction, governance, ceilings and cost reporting on top are included. The provider is your choice, and the platform keeps the choice reversible.
What is the commercial difference between SaaS and on-premises?
On SaaS the platform team hosts and operates the infrastructure ; the licence covers the service. On-premises the customer provides and operates the infrastructure ; the licence is an annual subscription at a rate that reflects that, with survival rights on the deployed runtime. Implementation services are scoped separately in both cases and quoted phase by phase.
What do survival rights mean for procurement?
If the on-premises subscription is not renewed, the deployed runtime continues to run on customer infrastructure indefinitely — no licence-check phone-home, no time-bomb, no remote kill-switch. Applications keep serving users, integrations keep firing, batch jobs keep running, data stays on the customer's storage. What stops is the flow of new versions, the AI services that depend on the platform team's cloud, the support relationship and the monitoring telemetry.
We are evaluating a visual application builder. Is this comparable?
They answer different questions. A visual application builder is sized for the next departmental form, workflow or dashboard, and is licensed accordingly. Airtool is a supervised enterprise runtime that carries an organisation's strategic application estate — authored as metadata, compiled to native SQL on ten engines, with AI inside the perimeter and audit-grade discipline by default — and is licensed on two units with nothing gated. A twenty-minute session on your own data model, with a commercial architect present, makes the category difference visible before any feature list does.
What does the commercial engagement look like?
A fit conversation, not a checkout flow. The quote form captures the shape of the engagement ; a commercial architect responds within two business days with a written quote you can take to procurement. Where the fit is confirmed, an architecture review follows within four weeks and a pilot within a quarter.