Microsoft announces its own forward deployed engineering to help firms fully realise AI's value
Microsoft has introduced a new US$2.5-billion investment aimed at helping its clients embed artificial intelligence tools in their workflows as ROI on the technology remains elusive for many employers.
Its new Microsoft Frontier Company will have 6,000 industry and engineering experts to help customers "co-design, co-innovate, deploy, and continuously improve AI systems at scale."
"Enterprise AI engineering expertise with deep industry knowledge is required to build a system that acts as a continuous loop of improvement between the two platforms to fine tune agentic business processes, ensuring that a customer's intelligence compounds over time and delivers real business outcomes," said Judson Althoff, CEO of Microsoft commercial business.
"This is what Microsoft Frontier Company was built to do: focus on end-to-end Frontier Transformation, enabling customers to amplify their IQ with AI while refining their differentiated value in the markets that they serve."
Rodrigo Kede Lima, president of Microsoft Asia, leads the new Microsoft Frontier Company, where Althoff said he helped customers and partners translate technology shifts into business outcomes.
Rise of Forward Deployed Engineering
Microsoft's new investment comes in the wake of employers struggling to find value in their AI investments.
Most leaders (88%) in a Gartner survey in October 2025 said their organisation is failing to realise meaningful business value from adopted AI tools, likely due to employees not knowing how to integrate the technology into their work.
Forward deployed engineering (FDE) has emerged as a solution to help employers gain ROI from their investments, with the practice involving the deployment of engineers to help organisations embed AI at scale.
In Microsoft's case, Althoff said its FDE initiative has recently offered its services to the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG).
"Our engineers and industry experts partnered with LSEG (London Stock Exchange Group) to embed AI into LSEG Workspace, helping finance professionals ask complex questions and get quick answers across structured and unstructured financial content," he said.
"The solution is underpinned by a foundation that is iteratively refined through client feedback and real-time user testing that accelerates each cycle and steadily improves model quality and scope."
Althoff also assured that their clients' data, expertise, workflows, and decision-making processes will be protected.
"Their data, their IP, their competitive advantage — none of it is used to train models in ways that commoditi[s]e what differentiates them in their industry," he said.
"We built Microsoft Frontier Company to make sure that does not happen."
Microsoft's new operating business comes after Amazon also recently announced that it is investing in a $1-billion FDE initiative. AI firms, such as Anthropic and OpenAI, also established FDE groups earlier this year.
