The Duckbill Group
Duckbill provides enterprise cloud and AI cost management through its Skyway platform and professional services. The company serves large enterprises with complex hyperscaler and AI model lab contracts, combining contract negotiation expertise with proprietary benchmark data for compute financial planning.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded-
- Headquarters—
- Headcount—
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What The Duckbill Group does
Duckbill (legally L9 Labs, Inc., formerly The Duckbill Group) is a privately held US-based enterprise cloud and AI cost management firm operating a hybrid platform-plus-professional-services model. Its core product is Skyway, a unified, contract-aware AI and cloud data platform that tracks consumption, commitments, and invoices across hyperscalers, neoclouds, inference providers, and coding assistants, and applies scenario modeling, benchmark data, and invoice validation to support commitment decisions. The platform is delivered alongside professional services including contract negotiations for hyperscalers and AI model labs, flexible services retainers, and FinOps practice assessments.
The company serves large enterprises with complex, multi-provider compute commitments. Customer logos span media (The Washington Post), ecommerce and ticketing (Ticketmaster, Fanatics, Mercado Libre), developer platforms (Supabase, Airtable), observability and security (New Relic, Honeycomb, Arctic Wolf, Semgrep), gaming (Epic Games), social (Nextdoor), and marketing technology (Epsilon). Duckbill states it has negotiated tens of billions in cloud and AI contracts for its customers, and case studies cite annual savings in the millions per engagement with first-findings payback.
Duckbill monetizes through four revenue streams: Skyway Platform Subscription and Services Retainer (recurring), and Contract Negotiations for Hyperscalers and AI Model Labs (professional services). Go-to-market is sales-led and community-led in parallel: direct enterprise sales targeting finance, procurement, engineering leadership, and FinOps personas, supported by a top-of-funnel content engine anchored on Corey Quinn's "Last Week in AWS" newsletter and podcast, weekly office hours, FinOps Academy, and an active blog. Pricing is quote-based with no publicly disclosed tiers.
The Duckbill Group firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- The Duckbill Group
- Legal name
- L9 Labs, Inc.
- Website
- https://duckbillgroup.com
- Company type
- Private
- Operating status
- Operating
- Short description
- Duckbill provides enterprise cloud and AI cost management through its Skyway platform and professional services. The company serves large enterprises with complex hyperscaler and AI model lab contracts, combining contract negotiation expertise with proprietary benchmark data for compute financial planning.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
The Duckbill Group industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Cloud Cost Management
- NAICS
- Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (51821)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Cloud FinOps & SaaS Spend Management (BPAEAOAH)
Keywords
The Duckbill Group business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations
Revenue model
- Services Retainer: Flexible retainer services for enterprise cloud cost management, providing ongoing support for contract negotiations, FinOps practice assessments, and cloud management.
- Contract Negotiations - Hyperscalers: Enterprise cloud contract negotiation services for hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP) helping companies get the best terms and pricing.
- Contract Negotiations - AI Model Labs: Model and inference contract negotiation services for AI model labs and inference providers.
- Skyway Platform Subscription: SaaS platform subscription for unified AI and cloud data management, tracking consumption and commitments across providers.
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels3 records
Marketing channels6 records
The Duckbill Group product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Duckbill sells the Skyway platform, a contract-aware unified AI and cloud data platform that combines consumption tracking, commitment management, invoice validation, and scenario modeling across hyperscalers, neoclouds, AI model labs, inference providers, and coding assistants. Wrapped around the platform is a services practice that includes hyperscaler and AI model lab contract negotiations, ongoing services retainers, and FinOps practice assessments for enterprises.
Product overview
Duckbill (formerly The Duckbill Group) offers a platform-plus-services model combining Skyway, their unified AI and cloud data platform, with professional consulting services. Skyway is a contract-aware compute financial planning platform that tracks consumption and commitments across AI model labs, inference APIs, neoclouds, coding assistants, and hyperscalers. The services portfolio includes contract negotiations for AI model labs and hyperscalers, flexible service retainers, and FinOps practice assessments. The company also provides educational resources through Office Hours, FinOps Academy, and an expert blog. The portfolio is anchored by contract benchmarking, invoice validation, and scenario modeling capabilities that leverage the company's market pricing data.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Skyway: Unified AI and cloud data platform for compute financial planning, contract tracking, and invoice validation.
Products and services
- Skyway
Quantifiable outcome
- Save millions of dollars annually per customer
- +1 more outcomes
Companies that use The Duckbill Group
Customer profileNamed customers4 records
Segments4 records
Ideal customer profiles2 records
The Duckbill Group technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- No
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Feature4 records
The Duckbill Group partnerships and signals
Strategic signalScale indicators2 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights5 records
The Duckbill Group competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- CloudZero: Cloud cost management SaaS platform that provides visibility, optimization, and engineering-aware cost allocation across AWS, Azure, GCP, and Kubernetes. Directly comparable to Duckbill's Skyway in serving engineering and finance stakeholders with cloud spend analytics.
- ProsperOps: Automated AWS Reserved Instance and Savings Plan optimization platform focused on commitment discount management. Highly comparable to the commitment-tracking and scenario-modeling elements of Duckbill's Skyway platform for hyperscaler commitments.
- Vantage: Cloud cost observability and FinOps platform covering AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes, and SaaS spend with a self-service analytics interface. Closest direct competitor to Skyway for engineering-led FinOps teams wanting unified multi-cloud cost visibility.
Broad incumbents
- Apptio (IBM): Enterprise IT financial management and cloud cost optimization platform acquired by IBM, serving CIO/CFO-level stakeholders with hybrid cloud spend visibility and showback/chargeback. Comparable to Duckbill's finance and procurement personas, but at much larger enterprise scale.
- CloudHealth by VMware: Multi-cloud cost management and governance platform owned by VMware/Broadcom, providing allocation, optimization, and policy controls across hyperscalers. Comparable to Skyway for multi-cloud consumption tracking, though typically at a larger enterprise governance tier.
- Spot by NetApp: Cloud infrastructure automation and cost optimization platform (now part of NetApp) covering spot instances, autoscaling, and FinOps for containerized workloads. Comparable to Duckbill's scenario-modeling and commitment management, but with broader infrastructure automation scope.
Emerging players
- Ternary: Cloud cost management and FinOps platform focused on multi-cloud visibility, showback/chargeback, and commitment discount recommendations. Comparable to Skyway's commitment tracking and contract-aware scenarios across AWS, Azure, and GCP.
- CAST AI: Kubernetes cost optimization and automated cloud cost management platform with AI-driven instance selection and rightsizing. Comparable to Duckbill's engineering leadership persona and workload-level optimization, but focused on container/Kubernetes environments specifically.
- Usage.ai: AI and cloud cost optimization platform purpose-built for managing spend across AI workloads, model providers, and inference APIs alongside traditional hyperscaler commitments. Closest emerging competitor to Duckbill's positioning around contract-aware AI/cloud cost management.
- Zesty: Cloud cost optimization platform offering commitment management, automated scaling, and budget controls for AWS and Azure environments. Comparable to Duckbill's hyperscaler commitment tracking and scenario modeling capabilities for mid-market and enterprise buyers.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat5 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
The Duckbill Group social profiles
Digital presenceThe Duckbill Group financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
The Duckbill Group leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
The Duckbill Group funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds
Investors
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
The Duckbill Group M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about The Duckbill Group
What does The Duckbill Group do?
Duckbill sells the Skyway platform, a contract-aware unified AI and cloud data platform that combines consumption tracking, commitment management, invoice validation, and scenario modeling across hyperscalers, neoclouds, AI model labs, inference providers, and coding assistants. Wrapped around the platform is a services practice that includes hyperscaler and AI model lab contract negotiations, ongoing services retainers, and FinOps practice assessments for enterprises.
Is The Duckbill Group a public or private company?
The Duckbill Group is a private company. It is classified as founder individual operated bootstrapped and is currently operating.
When was The Duckbill Group founded?
The Duckbill Group was founded in -1.
How does The Duckbill Group make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Services Retainer is the primary driver. The others are contract Negotiations - Hyperscalers, contract Negotiations - AI Model Labs and skyway Platform Subscription.
Who are The Duckbill Group's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are CloudZero, ProsperOps and Vantage. Broad incumbents are Apptio (IBM), CloudHealth by VMware and Spot by NetApp. Emerging players are Ternary, CAST AI, Usage.ai and Zesty.
Does The Duckbill Group have an API?
No public API is recorded for The Duckbill Group.
What industry is The Duckbill Group in?
The Duckbill Group's product category is Cloud Cost Management. Its primary akta.pro industry code is BPAEAOAH, Cloud FinOps & SaaS Spend Management. Its NAICS code is 51821.