// wiki · guide · September 2026
Deals with AI products
Draft article. The deal forms are working reference points; the content of a specific contract is determined by the product and the parties.
A draft for discussion. The article answers four questions of an AI product deal: what to check, what to transfer, how to formalise and how to get paid.
The short answer
A deal with an AI product is a deal with layers: code, weights, datasets, documentation, people. The main choice is whether to transfer the model itself (a licence or an assignment) or access to it (SaaS, API, white-label). Most conflicts arise not from price terms but from defaults: the parties did not fix which layers pass and what happens when the model is updated.
The check
The buyer and the investor check six blocks: rights to the model and code, dataset provenance, third-party licences and open source, regulatory requirements, the team, client contracts — the full analysis in “Due diligence of an AI asset”. For a licensee a shortened checklist suffices: confirmation of rights (registers, contracts), absence of known claims, the composition of components.
Forms of transfer
| Form | What passes | When to choose it |
|---|---|---|
| Non-exclusive licence (by instances, users, inference volume) | The right to use the model within agreed limits | A typical B2B product sale; the vendor keeps control |
| Assignment of rights | Code, weights, datasets, documentation — in full, with warranties of title | Selling a product or a carved-out technology |
| SaaS / API subscription | Nothing passes; access under an SLA | A quick start, no infrastructure on the client's side |
| White-label / partner programme | The right to render the service under the partner's brand | Scaling through integrators |
| Joint development | Rights divided by agreement | Industry models on a customer's data |
Transferring the technology
- Completeness: weights without inference code and hyperparameters do not run — the contract lists the artefacts (checkpoints, configurations, pipelines, tests).
- Know-how: the trade secret regime must arise at the recipient on the day of transfer — otherwise the secret ceases to be one (Art. 1466 of the Civil Code).
- Datasets: only those with rights to them are transferred; the provenance log passes with them (data provenance).
- Updates: a licence of “weights 1.0” without fine-tuning terms loses value in a year — fix the versioning procedure.
Monetisation
- Subscription and payment for usage (tokens, inference): predictable for the client, requires metrics in the contract.
- Royalties from revenue or usage — a frequent compromise in white-label deals.
- A licence by domains and terms — the basic model of B2B sales.
- Taxes: a licence for register software and access to a service are taxed differently (the tax regime of an IT company); foreign clients add VAT questions (foreign services — the mirror situation).
Typical mistakes
- transfer “by acceptance act” without a list of artefacts and versions;
- a licence without usage limits — the client builds a product competing with the vendor's on the model;
- forgotten open source components in the stack — the product cannot be transferred (open source in the product);
- no terms on fine-tuning on the client's data: who owns the adapted version.
Drafting or reviewing an AI product contract is the work of technology rights practice and deals practice.