BDC Pricing & TCO

As of 2026-05-29

BDC pricing is consumption-based — TCO is no longer a one-time negotiation, it's an operational outcome the architecture produces daily. Cost components: compute, storage, data-product consumption, Databricks workloads (M034); exact metering (capacity units/credits) + RISE bundling are set by the customer's SAP contract — model the drivers honestly, never invent prices (§0i). The mental shift: architecture = cost — full-reload pipelines (M042), over-replication (M048), hot 12-year history (M071) all carry recurring price tags, making cost-optimisation (M043) first-class. Honest TCO compares against the FULLY-LOADED legacy baseline (BW maintenance + SAC + standalone lakehouse + integration labour, M031); BDC can be cheaper like-for-like only if consumption-aware — a naïve build can cost more. Separate predictable baseline from variable surge with guardrails. The defensible TCO model is the consultant's high-value, bill-shock-preventing artefact.