Collection · 7 entries

The FDE Transition

Forward deployed engineers are the fastest-growing seat in AI and the least defined. This series is written for the people in the seat and the leaders building around it: what the role is, what product, engineering, and sales owe it, what it owes them back, and how the work becomes roadmap. Two parts a week, each one written against that week's findings. Read in order; part 1 is the thesis and everything after is the operating model.

If you only read three
  1. 01The FDE Is the Product Builder Wearing a Visitor BadgeOpenAI raised $4 billion for a deployment company. Anthropic launched a $1.5 billion one. The role they hire for is the Product Builder, from the services side.7 min read
  2. 022,000 of 17,000: The FDE Shortage Is a Product ProblemOnly 2,000 of 17,000 US forward deployed engineers can deliver real ROI, and demand is up 2,100%. The gap is not talent. It is what the product lets an FDE do.9 min read
  3. 03Absorb Pain, Excrete Product: The FDE HandbackPalantir made Fujitsu a Global FDE Partner. When someone else does the deploying, the handback has to be a written packet with a date, and a decision back.10 min read

The full reading order

7 entries
  1. 01The FDE Is the Product Builder Wearing a Visitor BadgeOpenAI raised $4 billion for a deployment company. Anthropic launched a $1.5 billion one. The role they hire for is the Product Builder, from the services side.7 min readSep 26
  2. 022,000 of 17,000: The FDE Shortage Is a Product ProblemOnly 2,000 of 17,000 US forward deployed engineers can deliver real ROI, and demand is up 2,100%. The gap is not talent. It is what the product lets an FDE do.9 min readSep 26
  3. 03Absorb Pain, Excrete Product: The FDE HandbackPalantir made Fujitsu a Global FDE Partner. When someone else does the deploying, the handback has to be a written packet with a date, and a decision back.10 min readSep 26
  4. 04Same Model, Twice the Bill: The FDE Codebase ContractA UC Berkeley study found the harness, not the model, sets what an answer costs. That makes what an FDE changes on site a margin decision. Here is the contract with engineering, in three layers.11 min readSep 26
  5. 05In the Room, Not on the Quota: Who Owns the FDE PromiseA Forbes piece put FDEs on the sales team, before the signature. Job data says zero percent carry a quota. Here is who owns the promise, and the one-page handshake that says so.10 min readSep 26
  6. 06Month Two: The FDE Leaves, the Workflow Has to StayGartner predicts 70% of enterprises will abandon FDE-built agentic AI by 2028. The FDE to customer success handoff is where that starts. Here is the page.10 min readOct 26
  7. 07The FDE Scorecard: Count What Stayed, Not Who Was SentAnthropic will train 10,000 FDEs and AWS will credential them. Neither tells you whether an engagement worked. Four numbers that do, and five to stop counting.10 min readOct 26
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