Inventive AI Is a More Powerful Responsive (RFPIO) Alternative, Built AI-Native for the Modern Enterprise GTM Team
Responsive is a 2015 content library with AI added later, what one customer called “an RFP platform with an AI afterthought.” Inventive AI was built AI-native: agents that write each answer from your live sources, cite the passage, and score their confidence.
Book a DemoWhy teams choose Inventive AI over Responsive
- AI-native, not AI-added. Every answer is generated for the question in front of it, with a citation to the source passage and a 0 to 100% confidence score. Druva’s team, after running both, called Inventive’s AI “far, far better” than Responsive’s.
- No library bloat. The AI Content Manager catches duplicate, conflicting, and expired content automatically, so a 12,000-entry library stops being a maintenance project.
- One price, every feature. Unlimited users, usage-based pricing per RFP and questionnaire, no edition tiers, no AI add-on, no implementation fee.
- Enterprise security. SOC 2 Type II, Zero Data Retention with OpenAI and Anthropic, SAML SSO, AES-256, no training on your data.
Teams that switched from Responsive to Inventive AI, or evaluated both side by side and chose Inventive AI
Responsive vs. Inventive AI at a glance
| Category | Responsive (RFPIO) | Inventive AI |
|---|---|---|
| How answers are produced | Suggests the closest saved Q&A pair; AI agents draft from stored library content |
Generates a tailored answer per question from live source documents and your past responses |
| Trust and verification | Library entries with owners and review cycles |
Citation to the exact passage plus a confidence score on every answer; gaps flagged, never guessed |
| Content maintenance | Manual moderation; duplicate detection is string-based (Feedzai found it unmanageable at 12,000 entries) |
Automatic flagging of duplicates, conflicts and outdated claims, routed to the content owner |
| Knowledge sources | Content library plus connectors; premium connectors sold separately |
Live sync with SharePoint, Google Drive, Notion, Confluence; Salesforce, Slack, Google Chat; PowerPoint, PDF, Excel and Word ingested directly |
| Users and pricing | Platform fee plus user licenses plus add-ons; Emerging edition from $10,000; Growth and Enterprise quote-only; total cost typically 20 to 40% above subscription (Vendr) |
Unlimited users; usage-based per RFP and questionnaire; one flat platform fee; every feature included; plan starts from $830/mo, billed annually |
| Implementation | Months in customer reports; professional services and premium onboarding priced separately |
Knowledge Hub set up in days (Insider: 5 days to first RFP); onboarding included |
| Security and AI training | SOC 2, ISO 27001, ISO 27701, ISO 42001, GDPR, CCPA, CSA STAR Level 1; no public policy on AI training or LLM data retention |
SOC 2 Type II; Zero Data Retention with OpenAI and Anthropic; SAML SSO; no model training on customer data |
| Adoption | Customers report heavy training needs for SMEs and salespeople |
#1 Easiest to Use on G2; 100% adoption by week two |
Hear from teams that switched from Responsive
“Compared to Responsive RFPIO, I think people have liked the tool, that’s for sure. They are happy with the AI response. They feel that it’s far, far better compared to what we have currently in our inventory.”
“Inventive has the ability to crawl more documents than Responsive did. So we’re able to add things like PowerPoint decks, which is where a lot of our information is stored, and PDFs. So I would say already our Knowledge Hub is better than it ever was in Responsive.”
“Responsive to me is an RFP platform with an AI afterthought. We’ve got a good process in place. I don’t actually need the process. I just need the tool to do it more effectively.”
Why Inventive AI is the best Responsive alternative
When teams compare Responsive vs. Inventive AI, the difference is where the work happens. Responsive (formerly RFPIO) is a Q&A library with AI layered on top: it suggests the closest stored answer, and your writers do the rest outside the tool, in Word and ChatGPT. Inventive AI generates each answer from your live sources inside the platform, cites the passage it came from, and flags conflicting or stale content before it reaches a proposal.
That is why Druva, Harte Hanks, Feedzai, HYPR and Health Hero replaced Responsive with Inventive AI, and why Druva’s 60-person solutions engineering org moved over in under a month with nobody going back.
Stop maintaining a content library by hand
Responsive only works if someone keeps the library clean, and at scale no one can. Feedzai’s 12,000 entries outran its string-based deduplication; Druva cut nearly 5,000 pairs down to 200 and still couldn’t keep them accurate.
Inventive AI replaces that upkeep with content governance. Connect SharePoint, Google Drive, Notion, and Confluence, keep the Q&A pairs you trust, and the AI Content Manager flags duplicates, contradictions, and expired claims as they appear, routing each to the content owner. Customers report content maintenance 70% faster.
AI that writes your answer, not reuses an old one
Responsive’s AI is bounded by its library: a close stored pair gets copied, a missing one gets a wrong suggestion. Expel’s proposal consultant called the output “copy and paste of a saved Q&A pair,” and Health Hero’s bid manager still edited answers heavily because they were not tailored to the question.
Inventive AI drafts from your approved Knowledge Hub and past responses, tailors each answer to the requirement in front of it, and shows a citation and confidence score before a reviewer opens it. Insider cut a 100-question RFP from four to five hours to under 30 minutes after switching.
“Inventive has not only helped us save time, but it’s also helped us win more. Our win rate increased by more than 50% after implementing Inventive.”
Implementation in days, adoption without training
Responsive front-loads the work: hundreds of files to upload, tag and convert into Q&A pairs before anyone sees value, then hundreds of salespeople to train on the tool. One investor relations lead said her previous firm held a Responsive contract “for probably almost a year” before meaningful use because “no one could do the initial lift to onboard it.”
Inventive AI’s Knowledge Hub ingests what you already have, so teams go live in days without a training rollout. Insider ran its first RFP within five days of setup. Harte Hanks produced and won a 150-question RFP about three days into its pilot.
“I really liked the platform. I actually used, I think, three of my live bids and I spent like an hour setting it up, and it was already giving me really good responses.”
Responsive pricing: platform fee, user licenses, then the add-ons
Responsive stacks three charges: an edition platform fee (Emerging, Growth or Enterprise), per-user licenses, and add-ons. Only the $10,000 Emerging price is public, and per Vendr the real total runs 20 to 40% higher once implementation and add-ons are in. Seats also gate who can help: Cushman & Wakefield passed because every occasional contributor would need a paid seat.
Inventive AI is one plan: pay per RFP and questionnaire, bring unlimited users, and get every feature, integration, and support included. It starts at $830/mo, billed annually.
Responsive company background: a 2015 library that added AI later
Responsive was founded as RFPIO in Beaverton, Oregon, in 2015 and rebranded in 2023. It grew by acquisition, including RFP360 in 2021, and its product is organized around a central content library with AI drafting from that library. That architecture is why customers describe its AI as an afterthought and why library upkeep remains the customer’s job.
Inventive AI was founded by Dhiren Bhatia, who built Viewics (acquired by Roche), Gaurav Nemade, founding product manager for Google Brain’s LaMDA, and Vishakh Hegde, a Stanford AI researcher who shipped production ML at Ambient AI. The platform was designed around retrieval-grounded generation, citations, and content governance from day one.
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FAQ: Responsive (RFPIO) vs. Inventive AI
Book a DemoWhat is the best alternative to Responsive (RFPIO)?
Inventive AI is the Responsive alternative most often chosen by teams that want AI to draft answers rather than suggest stored ones. It generates a tailored, cited answer for every question from live sources such as SharePoint, Google Drive, Notion, and Confluence, flags conflicting or outdated content automatically, and includes unlimited users on one usage-based plan. Druva, Harte Hanks, Feedzai, HYPR, and Health Hero replaced Responsive with Inventive AI.
How does Inventive AI compare to Responsive?
Both automate RFPs, security questionnaires, and DDQs, but Responsive is a content library with AI on top, while Inventive AI is an AI platform with a knowledge hub underneath. Responsive suggests the closest saved Q&A pair; Inventive reads the question and writes the answer, with a citation and confidence score. Responsive prices by edition, user license, and add-on; Inventive prices by RFP volume with unlimited users and every feature included.
Can I migrate from Responsive to Inventive AI easily?
Yes. Export your Responsive library and import the Q&A pairs into the Inventive Knowledge Hub alongside your documents. Druva moved 60 to 70 users and its library in under a month; Feedzai migrated 12,000 entries. Onboarding is included, and most teams run their first live RFP within the first week.
Does Inventive AI offer better AI than Responsive?
Customers who have used both say so. Druva’s RFP process owner called Inventive’s answers “far, far better” than Responsive’s. The difference is architectural: Inventive generates from live source documents with a citation and confidence score on every answer and flags gaps instead of guessing, while Responsive’s AI drafts from whatever is in the stored library.
How is Inventive AI’s pricing different from Responsive’s?
Responsive charges a platform fee for the edition, plus user licenses, plus add-ons and services, with only the $10,000 Emerging price published. Inventive AI charges for the RFPs and questionnaires you work on, with unlimited users, one flat platform fee that covers onboarding, and every feature included. Plans start at $830/mo, billed annually.
Will my SMEs and salespeople actually use it?
That is the most common reason teams leave Responsive. Inventive AI is rated #1 Easiest to Use on G2, customers reach 100% adoption by week two, and unlimited users means every SME can be in the platform instead of answering over email. HiBob’s proposal lead: “The platform is so darn intuitive that we’re able to do a lot of stuff ourselves.”