2 min lesson
Unit economics of an AI editor
Rebuild the sequence in "Unit economics of an AI editor" from memory, ending with the check that proves the outcome.
Step 1 of 3
Inference is the dominant COGS line at Cursor. The whole job reduces to one sentence: own the unit economics of running an AI product at consumer scale - the millions of daily users this exercise assumes.
The domain round opens here because everything else hangs off it. Capacity plans, chargeback models and R&D-prioritization debates all assume you can build the cost stack from the bottom. A weak candidate quotes a monthly cloud bill. A strong one starts at the token and rolls up.
Interactive diagram. Tab through its regions; each focused region shows its detail in the panel below.
Each layer rests on the one below and multiplies up to margin. Build it from the token, never from the bill - and know which layer a question is really asking about.