Pharos Production
Pharos Production: “Custom software development company specializing in Web3, blockchain, FinTech and AI development”.
When should we build an AI agent vs a direct LLM call?
“Build an agent when the task requires multi-step reasoning, tool use (databases, APIs, code execution), conversation state across turns or routing between specialized capabilities. Use a direct LLM call (OpenAI/Anthropic SDK) for single-shot tasks: classification, summarization, structured extraction, single-question Q&A. Most "AI features" are actually direct calls. Agents are for workflows, not features.”
View in the company profileHow long does it take to ship an AI agent?
“Allow 2-3 weeks for discovery and evaluation planning, then an estimated 6-10 weeks for a single-purpose MVP. A production multi-agent system with monitoring is estimated at 4-6 months. These are scope-dependent planning ranges, not additive fixed phases or delivery guarantees. Data access, tool integration and acceptance criteria affect the schedule.”
View in the company profileHow much does AI agent development cost?
“Pilot agent $60,000-$120,000. Production multi-agent system $240,000-$680,000. Enterprise platform $510,000-$1,600,000. Cost drivers: number of tools the agent integrates with, evaluation set complexity, observability and audit logging, regulatory requirements, post-launch monitoring tier. The biggest hidden cost is NOT the LLM bill - it is the evaluation set, guardrails and observability you need to safely run agents in production.”
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