Strategy·25 June 2026·Written by Sykik·1 min read
Local-First vs. Cloud-Only: Why Sykik Chooses Both
Local-first vs. cloud-only for enterprise AI. Sykik's hybrid approach gives you the speed of cloud and the control of local infrastructure.
Cloud-only is convenient, but you give up control. Local-first promises control, but requires expensive GPU infrastructure. Sykik gives you both — and lets you choose per workflow.
#Why Cloud-Only Is Not Enough
Your data lives on someone else's infrastructure. For routine email classification, that is fine. For legal documents, HR data, financial records, or customer communications with confidentiality requirements, the risk calculus changes. Cloud-only locks you into a single provider's data handling policies.
#Why Local-First Is Not Enough
A single H100 GPU costs roughly 30,000 EUR. A frontier-class cluster runs into hundreds of thousands and becomes obsolete in about 18 months. Most teams cannot justify that investment for the occasional need for a strong model. Local-first is great for control, but it is expensive and operationally complex.
#Policy-Based Routing: The Best of Both
Sykik lets you define routing policies that mix cloud and local: PII-sensitive data routes to a local model. Routine emails go to a cloud-based mini-model for pennies. GDPR-sensitive workflows stay in the EU region. The multi-provider gateway enforces your policies automatically.
#FAQ
Can I run Sykik completely on-premises? Partially supported today. Full support planned for 2027.
Where does my data run by default? GCP Frankfurt (EU) region unless configured otherwise.
Can different teams have different routing policies? Yes. Policies can be set at the organization, team, or user level.
Do I need to buy GPUs to run local models? Only if you want local inference. Many teams use a mix of cloud and local.
Is local-first slower than cloud? Depending on hardware. Local models can be faster for simple tasks due to no network latency.