How to get started with AI in your company without wasting money

To get started with AI in your company, do not buy a tool: pick one process that eats up hours every week, check whether the data it needs exists and can be accessed, and try it on a small scale, with a person who reviews what the AI does before it goes out. Measure it against how it was done before: if it saves time, you expand it; if not, you stop it without having spent much. Often what saves the most hours is not AI, but properly connecting the programs you already have.

Updated October 27, 2026

Book a meeting

Thirty minutes, free and with no obligation, with the engineer who would lead the project.

Start with the problem, not the tool

The question is not “what can we do with AI”, but “what makes us lose the most hours”. Orders copied by hand from email into the ERP, customer questions that are always the same, reports someone puts together every Monday, documents that have to be read just to pull out a few pieces of data.

Pick one. Just one, that happens often and where it is easy to check whether the result is right or wrong.

Where AI tends to work well

Reading documents: pulling the data out of PDF orders, delivery notes, supplier invoices or forms.
Preparing replies: email drafts based on the company’s history and terms, which a person reviews and sends.
Sorting and routing: issues, emails or requests that need to reach the right person.
Asking in plain language: questions about sales, stock or customers without having to build a report.
Summarizing: an opportunity, a case file or a meeting, with the next step.

Where it is not worth it

When the work rarely happens: a task done twice a year does not pay off.
When a mistake is very costly and nobody reviews the result.
When the data does not exist or sits where it cannot be accessed.
When the problem is the process: automating a mess only makes it go faster.
When what is missing is two programs talking to each other: that is an integration, not AI.

Data and confidentiality

Before trying anything with customer or company data, check where it goes. The free versions of many assistants may use what you type to train their models; business versions, under contract, usually do not.

Work with a provider that puts this in writing, give the AI only the data it needs for each task, and make it inherit the permissions of whoever uses it: it should not see anything that person cannot see. If there is personal data, the legal notice and the record of processing activities have to be adjusted to match. We are not lawyers: if you have a legal question, check it with yours.

A small, measured trial

Before you start, write down how it is done today: how long it takes, how many errors there are, who is involved.
Build a first version for the chosen process, with real data and a person who reviews every result.
Let it run for a few weeks alongside the usual way of working.
Compare it with what you wrote down. If it saves time, you expand it; if not, you stop it.

How we do it at SANFELIU

At SANFELIU, a custom software consultancy in Barcelona, AI goes inside the software where it saves hours, not as a product. If the project involves the whole business or more than one system, we start with the audit: a week at your company that ends in a phased plan with a fixed price per phase, and that also says where AI is not worth it. The plan is yours: you can carry it out with us, on your own or by training your team.

We work with AI providers under enterprise agreements that do not train on your data (Amazon Bedrock, Claude), and the AI inherits the permissions of the ERP or the CRM: it does not see or touch anything the user cannot see or touch.

Book a meeting

Thirty minutes, free and with no obligation, with the engineer who would lead the project.

Frequently asked questions

Where should an SME start with AI?

With one process that eats up hours every week and where the result is easy to check: orders that arrive by email, the questions customers keep asking, a weekly report. Before buying any tool, check whether the data it needs is accessible and run a small trial, with a person who reviews what the AI does.

Do we need to change our software to use AI?

No. AI can connect to the ERP, the CRM or the email you already use, through their APIs or their data, and work with the information where it is.

Does company data leave the company if we use AI?

It depends on the service. With business versions and a contract, the provider does not train on your data; with many free versions, you cannot take that for granted. Send only what each task needs, and get it in writing.

Is there funding for AI projects?

ACCIÓ-accredited advisor: we know the public funding available to Catalan SMEs and, when a programme that fits your project is open, we’ll tell you. The Bono IA from Spain’s Plan IA360 does not have a call for applications yet.

Tell us about your case in thirty minutes.

Book a meeting with the engineer who would lead the project: thirty minutes, free and with no obligation. If we’re a fit, we tell you how we’d start; if not, who to turn to.

Book a meeting

Or email me@joansanfeliu.com

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