Mechanism
Workflows, data, and methodology become embedded in one vendor's tooling such that switching cost is disproportionate to value extracted. Variants: technical (proprietary data formats), workflow (training built around one vendor's product), commercial (multi-year contracts with steep early-termination), regulatory (compliance posture references vendor-specific certifications).
Evidence (what the Evidence Register holds)
Contract terms on data export, exit assistance, and continuity; portability test record; alternative-vendor mapping; vendor-agnostic methodology documentation.
Mitigation
Methodology articulated in capabilities, not vendor names; contracts with portability + exit-assistance + continuity terms; multi-vendor architecture where feasible; quarterly exit-readiness review.
Editorial Framing
Vendor lock-in is the discipline that protects optionality. The mitigation is partly contractual (portability + exit-assistance clauses) and partly architectural (methodology articulated in capabilities, not vendor names). A function that cannot describe its AI methodology without using vendor product names has not yet escaped lock-in.
Indicative Examples
- Proprietary data formats with no export path
- Workflow built around one vendor's product such that switching breaks the workflow
- Multi-year contracts with steep early-termination penalties
- Compliance posture that references vendor-specific certifications