Standalone operator-research reports reading how executives buy, fund, and get leverage from AI — from inside the room, lane by lane.
Open Future Forum runs its operator-research from the same rooms. The Enterprise AI Buying & Budget Index reads the money in the CFO lane: who signs, where the budget comes from, what blocks the next dollar. The CMO AI Leverage Report and the CISO AI Leverage Report are standalone companions reading the same buying-and-budget question in the marketing and security lanes. The CEO AI Leverage Report reads the seat every function reports to: the signature, the mandate gap, and the distance between the decision and the proof. The Executive AI Leverage Report reads something else: the leverage itself, what it looks like when an executive actually has it, and how it was built. The AI Transformation Report reads across every lane at once: how far AI has actually moved from pilots into the way functions run, on four markers, spend, headcount, work, and governance. The CFO AI Market Map, the CMO AI Market Map, and the CISO AI Market Map read the supply side of the CFO, CMO, and CISO lanes: workflow-based maps of the vendors selling into finance, marketing, and security, paired with the same first-party demand signals. The YC Founder AI Report reads the supply side from the founders themselves: who they believe buys their AI and how they charge, with the Founder AI Pricing Index as its flagship. None of the ten size the AI market from above. All ten read from inside the room: the executives and founders who actually hold AI budgets, build AI, and use AI daily, answering in their own words.
Every figure states its response base. No headline is published below 40 responses. Early reads are labeled as directional. A smaller claim, fully backed, beats a larger one that invites the obvious critique.
The supply side, read from the founders themselves: who they believe owns the AI buying decision inside the companies they sell to, and how they charge. The flagship metric is the Founder AI Pricing Index — 68 percent in Edition 1, the share of charging founders pricing on usage or outcomes (base 136). Zero of 148 founders named security as their buyer, a zero that held as the base grew 61 percent. Independent research from the founder rooms; not affiliated with or endorsed by Y Combinator.
A companion to the CISO AI Leverage Report reading the supply side: a workflow-based map of 63 security AI vendors across agent and model security, AI SOC, identity and access, cloud exposure, application security, data security, GRC, and security automation — paired with first-party demand signals from 79 application-stage survey responses. No scores, no rankings: agent access is the clearest demand signal, and funding is real but uneven.
A companion to the CMO AI Leverage Report reading the supply side: a workflow-based map of 64 marketing AI vendors across content, creative, campaigns, SEO/GEO/AEO, analytics and attribution, lifecycle, social, and the agentic/copilot layer — paired with first-party demand signals from 55 application-stage survey responses. No scores, no rankings: marketing buyers are already piloting or running agents, and what they asked for was proof, not more AI.
A companion to the CFO AI Leverage Report reading the supply side: a workflow-based map of 64 finance AI vendors across close, FP&A, AP and expense, treasury, audit, procurement, tax, and the agentic/copilot layer — paired with first-party demand signals from 421 application-stage survey responses. No scores, no rankings: where the supply is crowded, where the buyers are, and where the two don’t line up yet.
72 percent of CEOs call themselves the main AI decision-maker (BCG). Our own rooms rhyme: the CEO is the most named signer of a new AI purchase at 47 percent. This report reads the mandate gap that follows: the CEO signs the most and sits furthest from the proof, while founders selling in pitch the CIO or CTO and the business unit instead. The flagship metric is the CEO AI Leverage Index, reading whether the seat that signs can close the distance to the seats that prove.
Innovation budgets fell from 25 percent to 7 percent of enterprise AI spend in a year, yet only 7 percent of firms have fully scaled AI. This cross-lane report reads that transformation gap from inside the room: deployment is real, but funding is still mostly net-new, governance is funded case by case, and the sign-off seat sits far from the work. The flagship metric is the AI Transformation Index, tracking the last transition on the report's own four-stage curve: exploring, piloting, deployed, embedded.
The agentic AI security market is forecast to grow 42 percent a year while security budgets grew just 4 percent. This report reads that gap from inside the room. The flagship metric is the CISO AI Leverage Index: the share of security leaders who say AI now lets the security function cover more surface without growing the team. Edition 1 covers the AI agent governance budget gap, the seat gap with founders, and the smallest, most selective lane in the network.
Marketing holds the largest functional share of enterprise AI budgets of any operating function, on a budget that is flat. This report reads that shift from inside the room. The flagship metric is the CMO AI Leverage Index: the share of marketing leaders who say AI now lets marketing grow output without growing headcount or agency spend. Edition 1 covers the marketing lane's agentic go-to-market data, early instrument reads with bases shown, and the founder-buyer seat gap.
What the data says about how executives are getting leverage from AI, and what the leverage looks like from inside the rooms. Six data findings from 421 respondents across seven 2026 events, the Executive AI Leverage Ladder framework, and seven practices from finance peer-learning sessions.
The center of gravity in enterprise AI buying is shifting to finance. This report reads that shift from inside the room. The flagship metric is the CFO AI Leverage Index: the share of finance leaders who say AI now lets them grow output without growing the team. Edition 1 covers event data from 200+ registrations across 20+ events in 2026, early instrument reads with bases shown, and the full evidence base behind five theses.
The Executive AI Leverage Report's Edition 1 ships once its flagship reading clears the program's response floor. Each report carries a stable URL under /research/ and a dated edition number. Prior editions remain published so each line can be tracked over time.