Internal Software

AI has collapsed the cost of building and maintaining software. The intranet bet finally starts to pencil out.

In 1994, companies were starting to ask what the internet could do inside their own walls.

Steven Telleen coined the term: the intranet.

The promise was simple. One private network where employees could find information, access tools and work together.

The market moved quickly. By 1995, Bear Stearns valued the intranet market at $8 billion, four times the internet.

Even Netscape, in the middle of the browser war, pivoted the company toward intranet services.

Everyone wanted a portal.

The first internal software cycle

1995

Bear Stearns

$8B intranet

4× the internet

1996

Netscape

Company-wide pivot

Everyone wanted a portal

2000s

SharePoint era

Content graveyard

Maintenance could not keep up

Today

AI era

The cost collapses

The bet starts to pencil out

Companies launched polished portals, but soon realized they couldn't afford to keep them current.

So they stopped building and started buying.

SaaS vendors could spread the cost of one product across thousands of customers. That made software cheaper, but standardized.

Companies built their workflows around these tools, then stitched dozens of them together.

They got better software, but ownership disappeared.

But today things have changed. The 90s failure had one root cause.

Building was too expensive.

Cost to build + maintain

1996Today

1996

Too expensive

Today

AI collapses the variable

AI has collapsed that exact variable.

When the cost of building and maintaining software collapses, the 1996 bet starts to pencil out.

But that doesn't mean everyone should start building their own tools with AI.

Internal software works when it's treated like a product, not a side project.

A small, dedicated team that owns the company's internal infrastructure.

AI doesn't remove the need for that team. It raises how much one team can build and maintain.

The new operating model

One team owns the system