Dev Interrupted The CTO must now think like the CFO to survive | Sancus Ventures’ Lake Dai
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Nov 4, 2025 Join Lake Dai, an Adjunct Professor at Carnegie Mellon and founder of Sancus Ventures, as she reveals how AI is reshaping leadership roles. She emphasizes the shift of engineering leaders into CFO-like positions, managing soaring compute costs that can take up to 50% of operating expenses. Lake highlights the urgent need for comprehensive AI governance and suggests innovative solutions, such as AI 'flight simulators' for training. Her insightful advice? Focus on the fundamentals to successfully navigate this fast-evolving landscape.
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AI Is Now An Operating Metric
- AI has become an operating metric that boards and earnings calls now track, forcing engineering leaders to show business impact.
- Engineering leaders must measure AI by business outcomes like cost savings, conversion lift, and time reduction.
Compute Can Dominate Your OpEx
- Compute costs have exploded and now dominate OpEx for many AI-native companies.
- Engineering leaders must forecast and justify compute like a CFO because it can be 30–50% of operating costs.
Forecast Compute Like A CFO
- Prepare to answer finance questions about quarterly compute spend and supply risk proactively.
- Model scenarios for cost reduction, supply shortages, and business impact before CFOs ask.