Build a Frontier business
Frontier organisations run on human-agent teams: people set the direction, and AI agents do more of the operating. TTD helps you get there on the Microsoft AI stack, from your first assessment to governed agents in production.
Microsoft partner or service firm? See how we help partners become Frontier.
What Frontier means
What is a Frontier business?
Microsoft calls them Frontier Firms: organisations built around intelligence on tap, where people and AI agents work side by side. Agents take on tasks and whole workflows. People set the direction, check the work and make the judgement calls. Every employee becomes, in Microsoft’s words, an agent boss.
Becoming Frontier is not a licence purchase. It means redesigning how work gets done, on data you trust, with agents you can govern, and with people who have the skills to lead them. That is the work we do with our clients.
| Compare | Using AI tools | A Frontier business |
|---|---|---|
| How AI is used | Individuals try assistants | Agents run workflows, people lead them |
| Where the value is | Personal productivity | Processes, customers and new products |
| Data | Scattered and often overshared | Grounded, permission-aware and governed |
| Trust | Policies on paper | Every agent has an identity, an owner and oversight |
| People | A few AI champions | Everyone knows how to direct and check agents |
The road to Frontier
Most organisations move one stage at a time. We use the same four stages as our free Frontier Readiness Assessment, so you always know where you stand and what comes next.
Experimenting
Pilots and pockets
Teams try AI tools on their own. Value is anecdotal, and questions about data, security and ownership are still open.
How we help: find out where you stand, set guardrails and pick the use cases worth funding.
Adopting
Human with assistant
Assistants help people draft, summarise and search. Productivity improves, but the way the work is done has not changed yet.
How we help: ground AI in your own data, build skills and put your first agent into production.
Scaling
Human-led agents
Agents join teams as digital colleagues and take on defined tasks. People direct the agents and review their work.
How we help: build agents into your core processes and systems, with identity, monitoring and approvals.
Frontier
Human-led, agent-operated
Agents run whole workflows end to end and escalate the exceptions. People set strategy, oversee the agents and keep improving them.
How we help: redesign processes around agents, measure the value and govern a growing number of agents.
Where a Frontier business creates value
Four places to put agents to work, on two foundations that make them safe to scale. These are the pillars of Microsoft’s Frontier Transformation framework, and the ones our assessment scores.
Enrich employee experiences
Give people agents that find answers, draft the routine work and hand back time for judgement and customers.
We build: a Knowledge Agent that answers from company knowledge, with permissions and citations.
Reinvent customer engagement
Serve customers faster and more personally, with people stepping in where it matters most.
We build: assistants and self-service portals grounded in your data, like the platforms we run for IUA.
Reshape business processes
Move whole workflows, such as intake, claims, onboarding and approvals, from manual steps to agents.
We build: Document Intelligence and a Workflow Agent: AI recommends, guardrails check, a person approves.
Bend the curve on innovation
Ship new products and services faster, and turn what your organisation knows into new value.
We build: AI-enabled products and platforms on Microsoft Foundry and Azure, delivered by a project delivery team.
How we help
How TTD helps you build a Frontier business
One partner from first assessment to agents in production. Every step uses services we already deliver, so you can start small and keep going.
Know where you stand
See your Frontier stage, your readiness across the Microsoft AI stack and your people’s AI skills before you commit budget.
- Free Frontier Readiness Assessment, with a Firm and a Partner track
- AI Readiness for People: individual and anonymous team skills scans
- An Enterprise Workspace to compare views across your leadership team
Fund the right agents
Turn ambition into a short list of agents worth building, with the business case and the blockers in plain view.
- AI Readiness Sprint: 10 business days, fixed scope and fixed price
- Three use cases ranked by value, feasibility and risk
- A Microsoft Foundry-aligned target architecture and a 90-day roadmap
Put agents to work
Start from proven accelerators and build what is specific to you, connected to the systems you already run.
- AI Accelerators: Document Intelligence, Knowledge Agent and Workflow Agent
- Custom agents and apps on Microsoft Foundry, Azure OpenAI and Azure AI Search
- Delivered by a Project Delivery Team or Embedded Developers in your team
Lead with people, scale with trust
Make agents part of how your organisation works, and keep them safe as their number grows.
- Agent identity, ownership, monitoring and human approval built in
- Change management and skills, so every employee can lead agents
- Repeat the assessment in waves to track your progress
Customer zero
We build Frontier the way we run it
TTD is its own first customer. We build and run AI agents in our own business before we recommend them in yours. Our engineers use GitHub Copilot every day and set aside time each week for AI learning.
Built on Microsoft
One platform, not a pile of tools
Frontier businesses run on a platform. Our Frontier Readiness Assessment scores you across each layer of the Microsoft AI stack, so you can see where to invest first. Our engineers then build where Microsoft has verified us: apps, data and AI on Azure.
Aligned to Microsoft’s Frontier Transformation framework. TTD’s Frontier approach and assessments are independent and are not produced, reviewed or endorsed by Microsoft. Product names are trademarks of their owners.
About Our Partnership
For Microsoft partners and service firms
Leading customers to Frontier? Become Frontier first.
Partners who sell AI transformation need to run on it. Our Frontier Partner track shows how far your own firm has come, from augmenting your people with AI to changing how you deliver and charge for your work.
- See whether you run AI side projects, AI projects sold by the hour, repeatable offers as customer zero, or an AI-native practice
- Spot the risks that hold partners back, such as revenue still tied to hours
- Get a 30/60/90-day roadmap, and add our Embedded Developers when you need more hands to deliver
Six Frontier Partner pillars
Frequently asked questions
Ready to build your Frontier business?
Find your stage in about six minutes, then talk to us about your first 90 days.
Or email info@ttdconsulting.net. We reply within 24 hours.