Internal Knowledge AI Search for a Consulting Firm in London

The verdict in three sentences

For a London consulting firm of 120 consultants, an internal AI search engine (a so-called RAG architecture) over 40,000 documents costs 22,000 to 52,000 GBP in 2026, plus 260 to 1,050 GBP a month in model usage and hosting. If each consultant saves 2 hours a week, the firm recovers about 11,000 hours a year, which repays the project within weeks even under a cautious assumption. The non-negotiable condition is enforcing existing access rights and UK or EU hosting, without which the partners' committee will rightly block the project.

What the budget covers

An AI search engine is not a chatbot plugged into a shared folder. You need to index SharePoint, the CRM and project spaces, extract text from PDFs and PowerPoint decks, chunk documents, compute vectors, then filter every answer by the user's permissions.

Both versions return answers with links to source documents. The higher version adds business filters (sector, client, year, deliverable type), confidential document detection and a usage dashboard for the knowledge management team.

Monthly usage cost and hosting choices

These are 2026 ballpark figures. Leading model providers now offer regional processing with no reuse of data for training, which must be written into the contract. For the most sensitive clients (defence, healthcare), an open source model hosted with a UK or EU cloud remains possible, at roughly 700 to 1,300 GBP more per month.

The rules that make the tool reliable

The tool must cite its sources: an answer with no link to the original document should never go into a client proposal. Access rights are checked at query time, not only at indexing, otherwise a consultant leaving a project keeps access to its deliverables. Finally, a set of 200 reference questions acts as a benchmark: measure the correct answer rate before go-live (target 85% or more) and every quarter after.

Mini case study

Charlotte, COO of a 120-consultant strategy firm in the City of London, picks a 37,000 GBP version at 600 GBP a month. Cautious assumption: 1 hour saved per consultant per week instead of 2, over 44 weeks, or 5,280 hours a year.

Valued at an internal cost of 65 GBP an hour, those hours are worth 343,200 GBP a year. Even if only a third of that time turns into billable work or better proposals, the gain exceeds 110,000 GBP, against a first-year cost of 37,000 + 7,200 = 44,200 GBP. Payback: under 6 months.

FAQ

Are our client documents sent to the model provider?

Only the relevant excerpts for a query are transmitted, processed regionally and not used for training, under the provider's contractual commitments. To go further, a self-hosted open source model removes that flow, for 700 to 1,300 GBP more per month.

How long does the project take?

Allow 8 to 12 weeks: 2 weeks of scoping, 4 to 6 weeks of connectors and indexing, 2 to 4 weeks of evaluation and a pilot with 15 to 20 consultants.

What about documents in other languages?

Current models handle multilingual search: a question in English finds a deliverable in French. Simply include 20% of non-English questions in the evaluation set.

Can the tool draft a client proposal?

It can produce a first outline in 2 minutes from 3 to 5 similar proposals, with sources. A partner review remains essential, and the real saving is around 3 to 4 hours per proposal.

How do we measure adoption?

The dashboard tracks weekly queries, click-through on sources and unanswered questions. A reasonable target is 60% of consultants active each month after 3 months.

Let's scope your project. Tell us your document sources and volume: we will price an AI search engine between 22,000 and 52,000 GBP, delivered in 8 to 12 weeks with UK or EU hosting. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.