For AI labs, venture builders, joint ventures and deployment companies that need senior industrial practitioners — not researchers, not generalist operators, but people who have carried AI into real production environments and can bridge the gap between a research roadmap and a factory floor. As Founding Industry Partners, domain leads or deployment architects, they bring the industrial reality that determines whether a product or a platform survives contact with manufacturing. This is not for end-user manufacturers; it is for the organizations building the technology and the ventures that will serve them.
We connect labs and ventures with practitioners who have deployed AI across automotive, aerospace, food, pharmaceutical, energy and chemicals. Tell us your venture stage and sector focus, and within 48 hours we propose two or three experts who fit.
Models perform well in benchmarks. The question is whether they survive MES, SCADA, edge constraints and shift operators. A deployment architect with production experience designs the integration path before you build the wrong product.
A Founding Industry Partner brings the domain credibility, the use-case prioritisation and the customer access that a technology-first founding team lacks. They do not write papers — they have deployed AI in the sector you are targeting.
One partner brings the technology, the other brings the plants. The deployment architect translates between the two — designing the integration, managing the operational handoff and keeping the deployment on track across both organisations.
A domain lead who can assess portfolio companies, identify deployment opportunities across plants and guide the industrial AI roadmap for the fund — without the overhead of a full-time platform team.
An industrial practitioner does not replace your strategy team. They bring the production-floor evidence that turns a hypothesis into a decision — and they have lived with the consequences of getting it wrong.
For due diligence on specific industrial AI deals, see our technology due diligence for private equity service. For deploying AI inside a manufacturing organisation, consulting or forward-deployed experts are the right fit.
| Role | What it covers | Typical engagement |
|---|---|---|
| Founding Industry Partner | Domain depth at the founding stage: use-case selection, customer access, deployment credibility and vertical strategy for a lab or venture building industrial AI. | Equity-linked or advisory role during venture formation and early commercialisation. |
| Domain lead | Vertical ownership for a specific sector — automotive, pharma, energy, chemicals — guiding product direction, deployment design and customer engagement. | Part-time or fractional, with deep involvement at product and deployment milestones. |
| Deployment architect | Designing and validating the integration between an AI product or platform and a real production environment — MES, SCADA, edge, data pipeline, operational handoff. | Project-based, tied to specific deployment milestones or customer engagements. |
The engagement model depends on the venture stage, the depth of involvement required and whether the role is equity-linked or advisory.
For guidance on the architecture decisions that matter most, see our architecture guide covering MES, SCADA, edge and generative AI. For framing the deployment roadmap, the industrial AI roadmap guide is a useful starting point.
The engagement is most effective when these roles are involved on the lab or venture side — the people who own the technology direction, the commercial strategy and the deployment reality:
For sectors where the network has deployment experience, see automotive, food and beverage, pharmaceutical manufacturing, energy, aerospace and chemicals.
This service is for AI labs, venture builders, joint ventures and deployment companies that need senior industrial practitioners to connect their research or product to real production environments. It is not for end-user manufacturers looking to deploy AI in their own plants — that is covered by our consulting, project leadership and forward-deployed services.
A Founding Industry Partner brings the industrial domain depth that a lab or venture lacks at the founding stage: which production problems are real, which constraints matter, which use cases have commercial pull, and how to design a deployment that survives contact with a factory floor.
Yes. The network includes practitioners with deployment experience in automotive, aerospace, food, pharmaceutical, energy and chemicals, across agentic AI, computer vision, edge AI, digital twins and predictive maintenance.
The form on this page. Within 48 business hours you receive a proposal with practitioners from the network who fit your venture stage, your sector focus and your deployment ambition. You decide whether to proceed; the proposal itself carries no cost or commitment.
Yes. For PE and VC firms evaluating industrial AI investments or building portfolio capability, we provide domain leads and deployment architects. For technology due diligence on specific deals, see our industrial AI due diligence service.
Your venture stage, your sector focus and the deployment challenge. That is enough for us to prepare the proposal.